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  The other heavy had his arms round the girl’s neck, constricting it tightly. I raised the gun. ‘Let her go,’ I said.

  He narrowed his eyes, uncertain what to do. He didn’t know whether to take me seriously. Or just ignore me. To prove my point I held the gun out at arm’s length, aiming at his head. ‘Let her go,’ I repeated.

  ‘Do as the man asks,’ came a voice behind me. It was Lady McLean. Reluctantly the heavy obeyed her instructions.

  The girl slumped down on to a chair and put her head in her hands.

  ‘That was a very brave thing you did, young man.’ Guy Cooper, who miraculously had regained his former demeanour, patted me on the back. ‘I think you saved my life.’

  I attempted a shy grin. I didn’t think it was appropriate to tell him that I had acted for the girl’s sake and not to save his scrawny fascist neck.

  ‘Shall I get the police?’ asked the heavy who had attacked the girl.

  ‘No, no. That will not be necessary,’ said Sir Howard, who had come down from the dais now that he saw that the danger was over. ‘We do not want to make a fuss about this, draw attention to such matters. It can’t do us any good.’

  ‘You mean you’re just going to let her go.’

  ‘I suppose I do.’ Sir Howard looked around the empty room littered with upturned chairs and scattered cushions. ‘It’s a great pity…that the meeting had to end like this. But it can’t be helped.’

  He was talking as though a careless soul had spilt a cup of tea and upset some cucumber sandwiches at the vicarage fete, rather than that someone had tried to blast a respected member of the club to kingdom come…

  ‘What do you think she was raving about? Her brother being killed by the Britannia Club?’ asked Sir Howard.

  Lady McLean put her arm around her husband’s shoulder. ‘It’s obvious that the poor girl is not right in the head. She was raving.’

  ‘Best place for her is in the nut-house.’ The heavy offered his medical opinion.

  While this conversation was taking place I studied the girl, who was sitting hunched up on a wooden chair. She was barely into her twenties and pretty, but bore the haggard expression of one who had suffered a great deal in her young life. She now seemed to have slipped into some kind of trance and gave the impression that she was unaware of what was being said or even where she was. She had put so much mental and physical effort into her plan that now it was over, now it was scuppered, she was a spent force and had retreated within herself.

  ‘What are we going to do with her?’ asked one of the heavies. ‘Surely we can’t just let her go? She tried to commit murder.’

  Sir Howard looked unsure. ‘What do you think, Guy?’

  Cooper stroked his chin thoughtfully, the restoration of his confident public persona now complete. ‘I think that’s the only thing we can do. If we get in touch with the police, it will bring the club unwanted attention from the authorities. They might well decide to close us down as a danger to public order.’ He sighed theatrically. ‘In the end, nothing happened. No real harm was done. We know her now; she’ll never gain admittance to the club again. Sanderson, look in the girl’s handbag and see if she’s carrying an identity card.’

  The heavy who had manhandled me obeyed orders and within moments withdrew the card. He read the information aloud: ‘Barbara Cogan, 34 Balaclava Street, Aldgate.’

  ‘Cogan,’ repeated Cooper, curling his lip. ‘A Jewess. That explains it all. Get her out of here.’

  ‘I’ll see she gets back where she belongs,’ I said firmly. ‘If we put her out on the street in the condition she’s in now, who knows what trouble she could stir up. She needs to get back with her own kind. They’ll see the sense of preventing her doing anything like this again.’

  ‘I think the young man’s right,’ said Lady McLean.

  Sir Howard and Guy Cooper stood aside and engaged in an urgent whispered conversation.

  Lady McLean came close to me and touched my arm. ‘It’s John Hawke, isn’t it? I remember you from yesterday,’ she said. I nodded.

  ‘You were very brave. We have to thank you for your actions.’

  ‘Indeed, we have,’ agreed Guy Cooper, having finished his confab with Sir Howard. ‘Yes, Hawke, we think you are right. Take the girl, deliver her to the bosom of her family and if you get a chance, warn them of the direst consequences if she should attempt to interfere with us again.’

  ‘You can be sure of that,’ I replied firmly.

  ‘Can we trust him?’ snapped my favourite heavy.

  ‘Certainly,’ said Lady McLean coolly. ‘I’m a good judge of character and I know that we can trust him, can’t we, Mr Hawke?’

  ‘I’m eager and happy to do all I can for the club,’ I said to underline my worthiness to the cause.

  Sir Howard came forward, grasped my hand and gave it a firm shake. ‘We can’t thank you enough, Mr Hawke. I think it would benefit all of us if we met later for a chat.’

  ‘Indeed,’ agreed Lady McLean, coming close and laying her hand gently on my arm. ‘My husband and I have organised a little drinks party this evening. We should be honoured if you’d come along. We could talk further and maybe interest you in taking an active part in our organisation.’

  What the hell was I getting myself into? Curiosity had led me to the edge of the mire—now I was beginning to sink into it.

  ‘Thank you, that would be very pleasant.’ What else could I say?

  ‘Good, we’ll expect you at 8.30.’

  I nodded. ‘I’ll be there. And now I’ll get this creature out of here and back to her filthy ghetto.’

  The three fascists exchanged gentle smiles at my nasty witticism.

  I leaned forward and took the girl’s arm and gently pulled her to her feet. She came without any resistance. As she stood, the others automatically took a step back as though her Jewishness was infectious and they might catch it. They watched in silence as I led the girl up the aisle to the exit.

  As we passed into the entrance hall, I breathed a sigh of relief and then suddenly realised how much I was sweating, sweating with fear. If I’d known I was due to play a central part in such a dramatic incident with a bunch of fascists, I think I would have stayed at home.

  We were just about to pass into the street, when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned and came face to face with the rough I’d first encountered in Benny’s café.

  ‘Bravo, Mr Hawke. That was most impressive.’ The words escaped in a sneer. ‘I must say I am most surprised to see you here. I really didn’t think your sympathies lay in our direction—not after your performance in the café the other day.’

  ‘Performance. Yes it was,’ I replied without missing a beat. ‘Don’t always judge a book by its cover, it could get you into a lot of trouble.’

  He was about to respond to this taunt and for a moment his fingers curled themselves into fists, but he managed to restrain himself. ‘Off you go with your little Jewish girlfriend. Make sure she gets home safely.’

  ‘She will. I hope you do, too,’ I said pointedly and ushered the girl out of the building.

  Once outside, I took a deep breath and let the cool air fill my lungs. I wanted to expunge all traces of the contaminated atmosphere of the Britannia Club. Somehow I felt dirty. Just being in the building, close to those people made me feel like some sort of traitor. I abhorred their views, their corrupted vision of the world and now I was being welcomed into their midst. The thought of it turned my stomach.

  The fresh air also brought some animation to my charge. ‘Where are you taking me?’ she asked quietly.

  I smiled at her and squeezed her hand. ‘For a cup of tea and a cream bun,’ I said.

  10

  We left the magical, pampered world of Manchester Square and headed for Soho and Benny’s café. Barbara Cogan, my little would-be assassin, walked quietly by my side as though she was a docile schoolgirl. She didn’t ask questions such as where we were going and why and she didn’t resist when I took
her arm to guide her through the throng of pedestrians. All the fire and ferocity which she had demonstrated in the meeting-room had dissipated. It was as though part of her brain had shut down, not really wanting or caring to know anymore. It was my job to revive her, to summon the real Barbara Cogan from the limbo into which she had retreated.

  ‘My name’s Johnny,’ I said, leaning close to her in my best Doctor Hawke bedside manner. ‘There is something rather important that you ought to know.’

  There was not a flicker of interest on her serene features.

  Undaunted, I continued: ‘I am not really a member of the Britannia Club. I’m not a fascist sympathiser. And I’m not an anti-Semite. I am your friend. Please believe me.’

  I must admit that it was a pretty tall order for her to believe me—to accept this story coming from a chap whom she had seen attending a meeting at the Britannia Club; a chap who had stopped her killing one of the club’s top brass and a chap who had agreed to pop back to join his fascist friends at a drinks party later that evening. I wouldn’t have believed me.

  I tried a different tack: bending the truth. Only a little. ‘You see, I am a private detective and I’ve gone undercover to investigate the activities of the Britannia Club. Look...’ I rummaged in my wallet and extracted a dog-eared business card. ‘This is who I am,’ I said, waving it in front of her with a kind of manic desperation.

  She looked at me for a moment and then took the card. She read it slowly and then looked at me again. ‘Is this…true?’

  ‘Cross my heart and hope to die.’

  A flicker of a smile ghosted itself across her features.

  ‘Then…why…why did you stop me?’

  ‘Because in the end you would have only hurt yourself. Where’s the sense in being hanged for murder? And if you succeeded in shooting that chap Cooper, that’s first degree murder and hanging would have been a certainty. After all you weren’t exactly short of witnesses.’

  The phantom smile made another brief visit. ‘I suppose not.’

  ‘If you want to damage the Britannia Club, shooting one of its senior members won’t do the trick. They’d soon replace him. There are plenty more bigots waiting in the wings, I can assure you. They’re like that monster from Greek mythology, the Hydra, isn’t it? You cut off its head and another two grow in its place. Something like that.’

  She frowned, confused by my classical allusion. I was losing her again. I should learn to keep things simple.

  Fortunately we had arrived at Benny’s café and without further reference to Greek mythology I ushered her inside. Although the lunchtime rush was subsiding, the café was still pretty busy and there were only two tables spare. I took the one nearest the window. Benny and his waiter Carlo were scuttering about delivering plates of hot steaming somethings to hungry customers and scooping up empty dishes to return to the kitchen. Eventually Benny spied me, and gave a cheery wave; then he noticed the girl. His face split into a broad grin. It was rare for Benny to see me with a member of the opposite sex and when he did he behaved like a clucking mother hen. He was already writing out the wedding invitations, picking out the church, happy in the thought that I was to become a respectable married man at last. Benny regarded the state of bachelorhood as only one notch up from being a slave-trader. He had married young himself but his wife had died from pneumonia before they had had a chance to have a family. Since that time Benny had dedicated his life to his little café. On the occasions when we were alone together late at night he would talk about his Sadie with more than a wistful glint in his eye. The old boy was a romantic and in a way he sometimes thought of me as the son he never had. And, like all Jewish fathers, nothing would have pleased him better than for me to settle down into the quagmire of married bliss from which he could vicariously breathe in the fumes of happiness. Before I knew it he had manoeuvred his way through the tables and was standing by my side.

  ‘So secrets you have from me now,’ he announced with a mock frown, then he smiled at Barbara. ‘Lovely secrets.’

  ‘This lady is just a friend.’

  ‘I should be so lucky to have such a charming friend.’

  ‘You have me.’

  Benny ignored the remark and continued to smile at Barbara.

  ‘So, you going to introduce me to your ‘just a friend’?’

  ‘Benny, this is Barbara. Barbara, this is Benny, who is famous for his salt-beef sandwiches and jumping to conclusions.’

  ‘Charmed, my dear.’ He bowed.

  Barbara seemed bemused by Benny’s performance but she managed a gentle ‘Hello.’

  ‘Now, you’d like some food, yes.’

  I nodded. ‘Yes.’

  ‘May I recommend today’s special—’

  ‘I’d like one of your famous salt-beef sandwiches,’ Barbara said.

  Benny raised his eyebrows. ‘Of course.’

  ‘Make that two and a dish of potatoes to share.’

  ‘It shall be done.’ Benny turned to go, but as he did so he leaned close to me and whispered in my ear. ‘Oh, Johnny, you’ve hit the jackpot here: a lovely Jewish girl.’

  After he had scampered away to the kitchen, out of sight, I leaned forward and took both of Barbara’s hands in mine. Looking at her closely for the first time I realised how young she really was. Despite her height and the grown-up make-up, she couldn’t have been more than twenty years old.

  ‘Barbara,’ I said and repeated her name three times until I had her full attention. ‘Tell me about your brother.’

  ‘Isaac. My brother, Isaac?’

  I nodded. ‘Yes. What happened?’

  ‘He died.’

  ‘How did he die? How was the Britannia Club involved?’

  Suddenly she lost the dreamy expression and her eyes shone brightly. She gripped my hands tightly. ‘They killed him. The Britannia Club. Some of them came down our way causing trouble. It happens from time to time. We have learned to live with it. We had the Blackshirts before the war. It’s a Jewish area and we’re used to trouble—but not like this. Usually it’s just louts who’ve had too much to drink and they want to do some Jew-baiting. They’re cowards really, because most of our men are away in the war and there’s no one around to fight back. My dad’s dead and I live with my mum and my kid brother. We just close our doors, pull our curtains and wait until it’s over. And then clean up the mess.

  ‘About a week ago about a dozen men from the Britannia Club came down late at night’.

  ‘How did you know they were from the Britannia Club?’

  She gave a grim smile. ‘They don’t disguise the fact. One of them carried a placard and they all wore the club badge. They were young men really. Immature…but inspired by their leaders to behave in such a way. That’s the way they seem to operate. They were out for trouble. They carry so much hatred in their hearts…’

  Barbara turned away and took a deep breath in a brave attempt to hold the tears back. I waited until she was ready to start again.

  ‘They marched up the street shouting, ‘Yids out. Yids out.’ They threw bricks through windows and hurled a lighted torch into Bernie Solomon’s, the butcher’s shop. Isaac, my brother, couldn’t stand it any longer. He ran from the house, shouting at them, warning them off, telling them that he’d call the police if they didn’t go. They turned on him, roaring like animals. They knocked him to the ground. They hit him…kicked him. They beat him about the head. One man in particular…he…I saw it all. I was watching from my bedroom window.’

  She snatched her hands away from my grasp and buried her head in them and sobbed quietly.

  What could I say? What could anyone say? I just sat there while the anger and disgust welled within me. Despite all the nastiness I had experienced in my life, I was still not immune to the cruelty that one person can inflict on another, that strange darkness that infects the heart of man. I felt like weeping too. Instead, I passed Barbara a fairly clean handkerchief which I’d extracted from my trouser pocket.

  �
��The bastards,’ was all I could think to say. Eloquence is not my strong point in such situations.

  ‘They left him for dead. But he wasn’t dead. I could see that he was still moving. I ran downstairs to go out and help him. As I came out into the street, I saw that one of the bastards had come back to him. He was leaning over Isaac’s body chanting…chanting, ‘Die, Jew, die.’ He snatched at Isaac’s jacket. He took his wallet. Then he saw me and ran off. When I got to Isaac I saw that there was blood all over the front of his shirt. He had been stabbed several times. The man who stole his wallet must have done it. Isaac died later than night.’

  Eventually she mopped her tears and dried her eyes, smearing away most of her make-up. Now that her face was clean she looked younger than ever.

  ‘You informed the police...?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘There was little point. They can never do anything. People are too frightened to say anything in case these monsters come again. We’re only Jewish scum after all. What does the death of one little Jew-boy matter? A little boy of seventeen.’

  There was a world-weary maturity in the manner of this young girl that was both impressive and sad. Life had caused her to grow up and experience grown-up pain far sooner than she should.

  It was true that there were regular skirmishes in Jewish enclaves in various parts of London, particularly the East End. Misguided zealots, frustrated by the war, needing scapegoats, went on the rampage. The police were virtually helpless in dealing with them. You cannot arrest a mob and the victims were reluctant to give evidence for fear of further repercussions.

  I knew of these things but now, coming close to the reality of it, I began to realise how terrible it really was.

  ‘So you thought you’d carry out some retribution.’

  ‘I had to damage them, for Isaac’s sake.’

  ‘We’ll damage them, Barbara. Believe me. But we’ll do it properly and legitimately. And we won’t settle for cutting off a few branches, we’ll aim for the root. Dig up the whole damn freakish growth.’

  ‘Are you serious?’

  ‘Cross my heart and hope to die.’