The Stratford Murder by Mike Hollow (best thriller novels of all time .TXT) 📗

He set off at a brisk pace towards the end of Cross Street, with Cradock hurrying to keep up, then on to Stratford High Street and the Regal. A garish poster at the cinema’s entrance proclaimed that it was showing something called Dr Cyclops, a film about which he knew nothing, while the B movie, equally unknown to him, was Room for Two, starring Frances Day and Vic Oliver. He smiled to himself. Every time he saw Oliver’s name he wondered how Winston Churchill coped with having a comedian for a son-in-law. It was difficult to imagine the grandson of an English duke having anything in common with an Austrian-born music hall entertainer – except, of course, a young red-haired stage dancer called Sarah Churchill. Her father probably thought Vic Oliver was as common as muck, he reflected, but then Jago’s own dad was only a music hall singer, so he’d probably think the same of him. Not that they were ever likely to—

Cradock’s voice snapped him out of his musings.

‘Shall we go in, guv’nor?’

‘Yes, yes. Go and find out whether she’s here.’

Cradock duly went off to find Cynthia, and a couple of minutes later she joined them in the foyer.

‘Good morning, Miss Carlton,’ said Jago. ‘We were just passing. There was something I wanted to ask you, so I thought we’d drop in.’

‘Do you want me to find somewhere we can talk?’ she asked.

‘No, that won’t be necessary – it’ll only take a moment. It’s a rather private question, though, so perhaps we could step outside for a minute or two.’

Cynthia Carlton followed the two policemen out through the main entrance, and they found a quiet corner to one side of the building where there were no passers-by.

‘So what is it you want to know?’ she asked. ‘Why all the secrecy?’

‘It’s not secret,’ said Jago, ‘but it is a little sensitive. When we spoke to you on Monday you said that Mr Conway had, as you put it, an eye for the ladies. Pardon me for asking a blunt question, but were you ever one of those ladies?’

Cynthia responded with a light-hearted laugh. ‘Oh, what a sweet gentleman you are – so polite and proper. You don’t have to mince your words, Inspector – we’re not Victorians any more, are we? This is 1940, and I can live my life as I please. I’ve nothing to be ashamed of. Yes, I did have a relationship with Mr Conway, and it went a long way beyond typing his correspondence.’

‘You speak in the past tense. Does that mean you no longer have that relationship?’

‘It certainly does, and good riddance.’

‘But you’re still working here?’

‘Of course, and why shouldn’t I? Like I said, this is 1940, and I don’t see why I should give up my job just because a man’s behaved like a rat. If he doesn’t like it, let him go and find somewhere else to work. And don’t start treating me like some helpless young maiden who’s been taken advantage of – I’m a grown woman and I can take care of myself. Why should I shed any tears over a man who seems to change his women like other men change their collar?’

‘So he dropped you for another woman?’

‘That’s a blunt way of putting it, but yes, that’s what he did. He couldn’t resist her. “Such a sweet soul” – that’s what he said when you came to the cinema, wasn’t it? Honestly, it’s enough to make a girl sick. I mean, now that she’s gone, he’s probably already eyeing up his next conquest.’

‘You mean he dropped you for Joan?’

‘Of course I do. You know he took her on at the Regal when the Broadway Super was bombed, don’t you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well, I think he’d seen her there and got her the job here so he could … how should I put it? Make his move? He wanted her a bit closer to the centre of his web, so he could pounce. And you know what I think? I reckon she was in the family way.’

Jago’s face betrayed no trace of surprise. ‘Why do you say that?’ he asked.

‘Oh, I don’t know, just something I heard.’

‘From whom?’

‘I don’t know, I can’t remember. But I had this feeling, anyway – call it women’s intuition if you like. Women notice these little things, in ways that men don’t.’

‘But did you ask her whether it was true?’

‘No, of course not. I wouldn’t do that, would I?’

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

A hint of mid-morning sun had broken through the clouds as Jago and Cradock made their way back from the Regal cinema to the police station. It brightened up the High Street and cast a warm, golden light on the stone colonnades and proud tower of Stratford Town Hall, which so far had survived the Luftwaffe’s bombing raids. Cradock wanted to know what they were doing next, but he could see Jago was thinking, so he held his tongue. They turned right at the town hall and were just passing the magistrates’ court when Jago stopped in his tracks.

‘You know, Peter, I think we’ve got it wrong.’

‘Got what wrong, sir?’

‘The way Cynthia was talking about Joan just now … I’ve been waiting for someone to confirm our suspicions about Joan, about her being on the game, but no one has – not the bobby on the beat, not her best friend, not her sister, and not even Cynthia, who hears all the gossip. It would appear she’s got nothing to thank Joan for, but the way she spoke, it sounded like she saw Conway as the villain of the piece, and Joan was just his innocent victim. She’d have good reason to blacken Joan’s name, so don’t you think if she knew anything about immoral goings-on in Joan’s background she’d have told us?’

‘She did say she reckoned Joan was in the family way.’

‘Yes, but she didn’t say it in a malicious way, and she didn’t try to make anything of it. I