Free A Bespoke Murder by Edward Marston Page A

member of the crew that Ernie Gill had proposed to.’ Dorothy was scandalised. ‘And third, much as I like him, he really upsets me sometimes.’
    ‘How does he do that?’
    ‘Well, he has a bit of a temper and uses bad language. I think he could turn violent if he was crossed.’
    Her sister clicked her tongue. ‘You don’t want that,’ she said. ‘On the other hand, a proposal is a proposal. A woman can’t afford to be too fussy.’
    There was deep sadness in Dorothy’s voice because she had never received a proposal of marriage. Irene had been the pretty sister. None of the boys had been interested in Dorothy. Now in her forties, she was a tubby and rather unprepossessing woman who’d given up all hope of finding a husband and settled for being a pillar of the local church, an occasional babysitter and the manageress of a shoe shop. She lived in the little house that she and Irene had jointly inherited at the death of their parents and staved off loneliness by renting out a room to a blind old lady named Miss James.
    ‘How long can you stay, Irene?’
    ‘If it’s all the same to you, I’ll stay indefinitely.’
    ‘What about your job?’
    ‘I’ve finished with the sea, Dot. It’s had one go at trying to kill me and that’s one too many. I want to keep my feet on dry land from now on.’
    ‘I don’t blame you,’ said Dorothy. ‘Though I do wish that I’d had all those adventures you enjoyed – sailing on a famous liner, going to America all those times, getting proposals. I mean, it’s so romantic.’
    ‘That’s not how it felt at the time. If truth be told, it was too much like hard work.’
    ‘So what will you do now?’
    ‘Look around for a job in London,’ said Irene. ‘I hope you don’t mind having me back.’
    ‘No – of course I don’t. It’s a real treat for me. Besides, you own half the house.’
    ‘Do you still have Miss James here?’
    ‘Yes, she’s no bother – keeps herself to herself.’
    ‘When did she first move in?’
    ‘It must be almost five years ago.’
    Irene smiled. ‘You live with someone for almost five years and you still don’t call her by her Christian name?’
    ‘No, she’ll always be Miss James to me.’
    ‘And does she still call you Miss Holdstock?’
    ‘Of course,’ said Dorothy with mock propriety. ‘I don’t allow any familiarity under this roof.’ They traded a laugh. ‘Oh, it’s so wonderful to have you back again, Irene. When I heard the awful news about the Lusitania , I nearly had a heart attack. I went to church every day to pray for you – and it worked. Thank God you came home on my day off so that I was here when you knocked. I can’t tell you how marvellous it was to see you in the flesh again.’ They heard the tinkleof a small bell. ‘That will be Miss James. I’ll go and see what she wants.’
    Dorothy got up from the table and went off, leaving her sister to look around the kitchen and see how little it had changed in the past decade. Irene was pleased to be back in the house where she’d been born and brought up. It made her feel safe and wanted. Yet she was not simply returning to her roots. Moving to London would be the start of a new phase of her life, she told herself, and that was an exciting prospect.
     
    By the time he’d finished interviewing the suspects from Shoreditch, Joe Keedy had elicited two additional names of people who took part in the looting of the shop in Jermyn Street. One was a member of the bar staff of the pub where the mob had been drinking beforehand. Another was a newspaper vendor with a regular pitch near Piccadilly Circus. Keedy sent off men to arrest the pair of them. The other three, meanwhile, had been charged and released on bail. They went off arguing furiously, each accusing the others of betraying him.
    When Keedy went to Marmion’s office to compare notes with him, he found the inspector poring over a sheaf of papers on his desk.
    ‘Hello, Joe,’ said Marmion, ‘how did