‘Well, sir, he doesn’t understand the real significance. If it came to breaking into a bedroom, I’d leave him behind.’ I read: January 18 Two evening papers 2d.
Tube return l/8d.
Coffee. Gunters 2/-
He was watching me closely as I read. ‘The coffee place was more expensive than I cared for,’ he said, ‘but it was the least I could take without drawing attention.’
January 19
Tubes 2/4d.
Bottled Beers 3/-
Cocktail 2/6d.
Pint of Bitter 1/6d.
He interrupted my reading again. ‘The beer’s a bit on my conscience, sir, because I upset a glass owing to carelessness. But I was a little on edge, there being something to report. You know, sir, there’s sometimes weeks of disappointment, but this time on the second day… ‘
Of course I remembered him, and his embarrassed boy. I read under January 19 (I could see at a glance that on January 18 there was only a record of insignificant movements): ‘The party in question went by bus to Piccadilly Circus. She seemed agitated. She proceeded up Air Street to the Cafe Royal, where a gentleman was waiting for her. Me and my boy… ‘
He wouldn’t leave me alone. ‘You’ll notice, sir, it’s in a different hand. I never let my boy write the reports in case there’s anything of an intimate character.’
‘You take good care of him,’ I said.
‘Me and my boy sat down on a proximate couch,’ I read. ‘The party and the gentleman were obviously very close, treating each other with affectionate lack of ceremony, and I think on one occasion holding hands below the table. I could not be certain of this, but the party’s left hand was out of sight and the gentleman’s right hand too which generally indicates a squeeze of that nature. After a short and intimate conversation they proceeded on foot to a quiet and secluded restaurant known to its customers as Rules and choosing a couch rather than a table they ordered two pork chops.’
‘Are the pork chops important?’
‘They might be marks of identification, sir, if frequently indulged in.’
‘You didn’t identify the man, then?’
‘You will see, sir, if you read on.’
‘I drank a cocktail at the bar when I observed this order of the pork chops, but I was unable to elicit from any of the waiters or from the lady behind the bar the identity of the gentleman. Although I couched my questions in a vague and nonchalant manner they obviously aroused curiosity, and I thought it better to leave. However by striking up an acquaintance with the stage doorkeeper of the Vaudeville Theatre I was able to keep the restaurant under observation.’
‘How,’ I asked, ‘did you strike up the acquaintance?’
‘At the bar of the ‘Bedford Head’, sir, seeing as the parties were safely occupied with the order for chops, and afterwards accompanied him back to the theatre, where the stage door ‘I know the place,’
‘I have tried to compress my report, sir, to essentials.’
‘Quite right.’
The report continued: ‘After lunch the parties proceeded together up Maiden Lane and parted outside a general grocery. I had the impression they were labouring under great emotion, and it occurred to me that they might be parting for good, a happy ending if I may say so to this investigation.’
Again he interrupted me anxiously, ‘You’ll forgive the personal touch?’
‘Of course.’
‘Even in my profession, sir, we sometimes find our emotions touched, and I liked the lady - the party in question, that is.’
‘I hesitated whether to follow the gentleman or the party in question, but I decided my instructions would not permit the former. I followed the latter therefore. She walked a little way towards Charing Cross Road, appearing much agitated. Then she turned into the National Portrait Gallery but only stayed a few minutes… ‘
‘Is there anything more of importance?’
‘No, sir. I think really she was just looking for a place to sit down because next thing she turned into a church.’
‘A church?’
‘A Roman church, sir, in Maiden Lane. You’ll find it all there. But not to pray, sir. Just to sit.’
‘You know even that much, do you?’
‘Naturally I followed the party in. I knelt down a few pews behind so as to appear a bona fide worshipper, and I can assure you, sir, she didn’t pray. She’s not a Roman, is she, sir?’
‘No.’
‘It was to sit in the dark, sir, till she calmed down.’
‘Perhaps she was meeting someone?’
‘No, sir. She only stayed three minutes and she didn’t speak to anyone. If you ask me, she wanted a good cry.’
‘Possibly. But you are wrong about the hands, Mr Parkis.’
‘The hands, sir?’
I moved so that the light caught my face more fully.
‘We never so much as touched hands.’
I felt sorry for him now that I had had my joke - I felt sorry to have scared yet further someone already so timid. He watched me with his mouth a little open, as though he had received a sudden hurt and was now waiting paralysed for the next stab. I said, ‘I expect that sort of mistake often happens, Mr Parkis. Mr Savage ought to have introduced us.’
‘Oh no, sir,’ he said miserably, ‘it was up to me.’ Then he bent his head and sat there, looking into his hat that lay on his knees. I tried to cheer him up. ‘It’s not serious,’ I said. ‘If you look at it from the outside, it’s really quite funny.’
‘But I’m on the inside, sir,’ he said. He turned his hat round and went on in a voice as damp and dreary as the common outside, ‘It’s not Mr Savage I mind about, sir. He’s as understanding a man as you’ll meet in the profession - it’s my boy. He started with great ideas about me.’ He fished from the depths of his misery a deprecating and frightened smile. ‘You know the kind of reading they do, sir. Nick Carters and the like.’
‘Why should he ever know about this?’
‘You’ve got to play straight with a child, sir, and he’s sure to ask questions. He’ll want to know how I followed up - that’s the thing he’s learning, to follow up.’
‘Couldn’t you tell him that I’d been able to identify the man - just that, and I wasn’t interested?’
‘It’s kind of you to suggest it, sir, but you have to look at this all round. I don’t say I wouldn’t do it even to my boy, but what’s he going to think if he ever comes across you - in the course of the investigation?’
‘That’s not necessary.’
‘But it might well happen, sir.’
‘Why not leave him at home this time?’
‘It’s just making matters worse, sir. He hasn’t got a mother, and it’s his school holidays and I’ve always gone on the lines of educating him in his holidays - with Mr Savage’s full approval. No. I made a fool of myself that time, and I’ve got to face it. If only he weren’t quite so serious, sir, but he does take it to heart when I make a floater. One day Mr Prentice - that’s Mr Savage’s assistant, a rather hard man, sir - said, ‘Another of your floaters, Parkis,’ in the boy’s hearing. That’s what opened his eyes first.’ He stood up with an air of enormous resolution (who are we to measure another man’s courage?) and said, ‘I’ve been keeping you, sir, talking about my problems.’
‘I’ve enjoyed it, Mr Parkis,’ I said without irony. ‘Try not to worry. Your boy must take after you.’
‘He has his mother’s brains, sir,’ he said sadly. ‘I must hurry. It’s cold out, though I found him a nice sheltered spot before I came away. But he’s so keen I don’t trust him to keep dry. Would you mind initialling the expenses, sir, if you approve them?’
I watched him from my window with his thin macintosh turned up and his old hat turned down; the snow had increased and already under the third lamp he looked like a small snowman with the mud showing through. It occurred to me with amazement that for ten minutes I had not thought of Sarah or of my jealousy; I had become nearly human enough to think of another person’s trouble.