“So what do you think?”
Billy sighed and turned away for a second as if to compose himself. “Makes me wonder what my young Billy will be like, when he’s my age. I mean, you try to look after them, you work hard to give them a better life than you had, and then the next thing you know, there’s a nutter somewhere over there wanting to take over the world. And that really upsets the apple cart for all of us.” He rubbed his forehead and looked at Maisie. “My instinct says, miss, that this man went to war. Of course, you could say he saw enough in Belgium, losing his brother and his father—losing everything, really—but he’s got that look, that stare in his eyes. He was a boy who’d done a man’s work, and I don’t mean the sort of work you do under a locomotive at St. Pancras Station. Speaking of which, I wish I’d had this when I went over there this morning.”
“What did you find out?” Maisie leaned forward. “Did you discover anything new?”
“I discovered that there was a different newspaper seller on the street—the usual bloke had to go to a funeral. And the tea lady couldn’t add much, but now I’ve got this picture of our Albert Durant, I could nip back over there tomorrow morning and ask whether anyone’d seen him around, and whether he was asking for Frederick Addens.”
“I’d love to find another connection between these two men, so while you’re at it, could you pop over to this pub and ask the same questions?” Maisie scribbled an address on a piece of scrap paper. “I was in there yesterday—it’s just at the end of the street where Frederick Addens’ family lives. The Crown and Anchor, it’s called. I’ve already been in, so I don’t want to spark any more interest than necessary—and I think the landlord would remember me. You know the sort of story to make up about Durant—debts, on the run from a wife, whatever you like—but see if he’d been seen in the pub. I have to be careful with Enid Addens. She’s very fragile, so I don’t want to press her too hard, or the daughter will pull up the drawbridge.”
Billy went on to recount the finer points of his visit to a Fleet Street pub where he met the contact who was now a reporter on the Daily Express. Having left school at fourteen, Billy’s friend had started work as a compositor’s apprentice, before enlisting for service in 1915, as soon as he was able. Upon his demobilization, he had returned to the Express, but this time as a reporter. According to Billy, it wasn’t just that Stan Ditton had a way with words—he landed his stories because he wasn’t afraid of much, not after the war.
“So Stan says to me, ‘I know about that Durant. I heard about the murder and went down there.’ Of course all the banks were closed on Monday on account of the war, and you know how quiet it gets in the City, after everything closes on a Friday and the men in their bowler hats go home.” Billy cleared his throat. “Stan says it was a street sweeper who found him, in an alley just off Paternoster Row. Poor fella ran out of the alley and raised the alarm. There was a lot of blood, and the body was in bad shape, on account of the weather and how long it had been there. A copper was close by, and it wasn’t long before the Murder Squad boys were on the scene and with no less than Spilsbury to inspect the body and then have it taken away for postmortem. And you know how important he is—they were bringing out the best for the job.”
“Does Stan have any information on who the police think was the murderer? I can’t say I trust Caldwell to be completely forthcoming.”
Billy shook his head. “No. In fact, he said they were apparently muttering about it being another attack just for the money, likely done by a bloke who isn’t too clever with a gun. He had a dekko in his notebook, and he confirmed that our mate Caldwell had told him, ‘The man we’re looking for is well and truly cack-handed, and shouldn’t be left alone with a wooden spoon, let alone a gun.’”
“Typical Caldwell,” said Maisie.
They each continued to recount news of their morning, with Maisie making notes on the case map.