Lestrade and the Guardian Angel Page 11

  ‘What’s this?’

  ‘It’s a letter of introduction from your colonel to theirs. And a thoughtfully provided crape armband for tomorrow’s service. The Minster, ten sharp. I’ll be there, of course. Not that you’ll be acknowledging me, Sholto, will you?’

  ‘Oh ye of little faith.’ Lestrade clicked his tongue.

  ‘Report to the colonel tonight. Lord Bolton. He’s staying at the Royal. And Sholto . . . wear your uniform. An officer of the Duke of Lancaster’s Own wouldn’t be seen dead in mufti like you’re wearing.’

  Lestrade bowed with a beam.

  ‘All this,’ he waved the envelope, ‘and the uniform. How did you get it?’

  ‘Let’s just say the colonel of the Duke of Lancaster’s Own owes me a favour.’ Blue patted the side of his nose with his finger. ‘I’ve been as thorough as I can, Sholto. But I need a face that’s unknown and a mind that’s sharp. I decided to settle for half that. Once you’re at the camp, you’re on your own. Don’t expect any boys in blue . . . er . . .’ He cursed himself for using the phrase. ‘Any help from me or mine. The Yorkshire Constabulary have done their bit. It’s up to you, now. Will you do it?’

  Lestrade looked at the crape armband in the envelope, ‘Tell me,’ he said, ‘do officers of the Duke of Lancaster’s Own Yeomanry dress to the right or the left?’

  ❖ A Horseman Riding By ❖

  T

  here was no answer to Lestrade’s knock at the door, but the giggling from within told him the room was occupied and he pushed it open. An elderly man with white hair and a military moustache struggled to his feet, stuffing yards of shirt into his trousers and throwing a comely lass off his lap.

  ‘Er . . . that will be all for dictation tonight, Miss Hard . . . er . . . castle. Same time tomorrow, eh? And don’t forget your pencil, what?’

  The girl brushed past Lestrade, stuffing extraneous areas of bosom into her corselet.

  ‘Er . . . memoirs.’ The old man rummaged for his smoking jacket. ‘Miss Hard . . . er . . . Parcel is taking dictation.’

  ‘I see, sir.’ Lestrade clicked his heels and saluted, the stab of his fingers on his gilt helmet forcing the chin-chain rather painfully into his lip.

  ‘Er . . . as you were . . .’ The old man waved at him in what passed among the aristocracy for a salute. ‘Lieutenant . . . er . . . ?’

  ‘Lister, sir.’ Lestrade stood as straight as he knew how.

  ‘Mister what?’

  ‘No, sir. Lister. Lieutenant Lister, Duke of Lancaster’s Own Yeomanry.’

  The old man peered closer. ‘Good God, yes. So you are. How’s old Ellesmere?’

  ‘Er . . . fine, thank you, sir. Nicest part of the canal, I always think.’

  ‘Eh? No, no,’ the old man chuckled until his apoplexy got the better of him and he subsided into an armchair. ‘No, not the place. Your colonel, Frank Egerton.’

  Blank.

  ‘The Third Earl of Ellesmere,’ the old man persisted.

  ‘Ah, yes, sir. Of course.’ Lestrade fumbled with the fastenings of his elaborate sabretache, only to get his fingers inextricably woven into his sword knot. In the end, he did the only thing left open to him and tripped headlong over his sword, lobbing his helmet into the waste-paper basket.

  ‘Have a care, Hamster,’ the old man said, steadying the officer.

  ‘I have a letter from him, sir.’ At last he pulled it out. ‘Addressed to you, requesting that I may watch the manoeuvres of the Yorkshire Hussars for the remainder of their camp.’

  ‘Really? Good God.’ The old man rummaged on the dressing table for his pince-nez, stuffing various ladies’ fol-de-rols into his pockets as he came across them, ‘Tut, tut,’ he said, in case Lestrade had noticed, ‘I really must have a word with Lady Bolton. Very careless of her to leave her . . . er . . . things around. You married, Dempster?’

  ‘Widowed, sir.’

  ‘Ah, condolences etcetera, etcetera. How long with the Duke’s Own?’

  ‘Ooh, a little while now, sir.’

  ‘How’s young Rutherford? Not so young now, I suppose?’

  ‘Not for me to say, sir.’

  ‘Shrewd answer. Loyal to one’s major, eh? I like that in a subaltern. Where are your estates?’

  ‘Um. . . Lancashire, sir.’ Lestrade thought it best to stay as vague as he could.

  ‘Quite.’ The colonel looked over his pince-nez. ‘Well, this all seems in order.’ He discarded the letter. ‘So old Ellesmere’s sent you to see some real soldiers in action, eh? When can you start?’

  ‘Tomorrow, sir. If that’s convenient.’

  ‘Ah, problem there, Twister. Funeral. Willie Hellerslyke, B Troop. Camp suspended.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Lestrade. ‘I heard about poor Captain Hellerslyke, sir. Perhaps I could pay my respects?’

  ‘Of course, of course. The Minster. Ten sharp. Full regimentals of course. Look forward to having you on the camp.’

  ‘Thank you, sir.’ Lestrade saluted with a little more confidence now. ‘Sorry to have interrupted your . . . er . . . memoirs.’

  ‘What? Oh, all right, dear boy. All right. Hard to find at my age, y’see.’

  ‘What is, sir?’

  ‘Mmm? Er . . . good secretarial help, what else? Good night to you.’

  IT HAD BEEN RAINING at the funeral of Captain Sir William Hellerslyke, Bt. Lestrade stood out like a sore thumb in his scarlet tunic and white plumed helmet. Everybody else appeared to be wearing greatcoats and forage caps. Unfortunately, the favour which the Third Earl of Ellesmere apparently owed to the Chief Inspector did not extend to overcoats, so Lestrade stood with the wet horsehair slapping round his face and the red dye from his sleeve running over his black crape armband.

  The Yorkshire Hussars lined the route to the Minster, massive and grey in its medieval grandeur, and the Yorkshire Hussars bore the coffin, draped with the rose and crown emblem saved from looking like a pub sign by the majesty of the Princess of Wales’s feathers. Behind, boots reversed in the stirrups, the dead officer’s charger, shabraqued and throat-plumed, clattered over the cobbles.

  Lestrade scanned the faces as he had countless times at other funerals. Grey anonymous eyes above grey anonymous moustaches. Blobby noses under dripping peaks. The officers clustered together like conspirators, but Lestrade’s alien uniform was probably the cause of that. A bevy of bowlers entered at the South door and Lestrade recognized the one a foot below the others as belonging to Little Boyd Blue. Then it was caps off and a trumpet fanfare burst on to Lestrade’s ear causing him to drop his helmet. Why did he have to be standing next to the Trumpet Major? And the Archbishop himself intoned ‘For Man that is born of Woman hath but a short time to live . . .’

  On the following day, which dawned deep and crisp and even, everybody but Lestrade had a field day. He could have predicted it wouldn’t go well when being introduced to the officers of the Yorkshire Hussars.

  ‘I didn’t know the Duke of Lancaster’s wore their pouch belts over that shoulder,’ one of them said.

  ‘Er . . . a new field order,’ Lestrade bluffed. ‘Personally, I feel damned uncomfortable wearing it this way.’

  He prayed everything else was in order. At least, glancing briefly down, each buttonhole of his patrols had a button in it. Conversely, the wind didn’t half whistle around the upright side of his slouch hat.

  ‘What do you think of the new Martini?’ another asked.

  ‘Urn . . . well, I’m a brandy man, myself.’

  There was an awful silence. ‘Oh, very droll, Lister. I was referring to the new rifle.’

  ‘Ah, that Martini.’ Lestrade felt the ground shifting beneath him.

  ‘Ah, Sar’n’t Major,’ the officer turned to the NCO, ‘Lieutenant Lister’s charger.’

  The beast the sergeant major had brought was a glossy black animal, and from what Lestrade remembered of his mounted duty days, about forty-three hands high. Its eyes were those of a deadly snake and its teeth the size and colour of
tombstones.

  ‘No, really, I’ll just observe.’ Lestrade stood back, folding his arms to show his contentment.

  ‘We couldn’t allow it,’ the officer insisted. ‘Knew you’d like to ride. Put old Hellerslyke’s troop through their paces, what?’

  ‘Oh, I couldn’t possibly . . .’

  But Lestrade found himself being lifted bodily into the saddle. It was just as well. He couldn’t possibly have got up there by himself.

  ‘His name’s Minstrel, sir,’ the sergeant major told him. ‘Answers to t’name of Minnie. ’Old ’is reins, sir. Steady. Steady. He’s a bugger on t’turns. Oh, and watch it wi’ sword. If you’re a bit on t’late side wi’ right protect, he’ll ’ave yer ’and off. Goo on, Minnie. Goo on.’

  The animal wheeled away from the knot of officers and Lestrade did his best to look comfortable. Thighs that pounded up and down the stairs of omnibuses were not used to gripping girths. He prayed and somehow he stayed.

  An officer of Hussars cantered alongside him, thrusting out a hand. Lestrade grinned but kept both his hands firmly on the reins.

  ‘Percival Daubney,’ the officer shouted above the jingling bits. ‘I’m the adjutant.’

  ‘Sholto Lister,’ Lestrade said, his teeth as clenched as his thighs.

  ‘Ah, you’re the chappie from the Duke of Lancaster’s. Giving us the once over, eh?’

  Once would certainly be enough, Lestrade thought.

  ‘Care to ride with Hellerslyke’s troop for the morning?’

  ‘Well, I wouldn’t want to spoil the show,’ Lestrade said.

  ‘My dear chap, not in the slightest. Come on,’ and the adjutant lashed his animal’s flanks and galloped across the open moorland, making green tracks in the frosted field. He wheeled into place in front of Hellerslyke’s troop who came to attention in their saddles, sword blades erect.

  Lestrade dithered. On mounted duty with the City of London constabulary he had only ever been one of the line, never leading it. Then, inspiration hit him and he tugged on the right rein. Astonishingly, the animal turned sharply about face.

  ‘Men,’ he shouted. Minnie’s ears pricked up and the beast backed up a little. ‘I know you have recently lost your commanding officer. I know too that Captain Hellerslyke would have thought it fitting that Lieutenant Daubney should lead the troop this morning. Lieutenant Daubney.’ Lestrade threw out his arm in a wild gesture and instantly regretted it. Minnie swerved violently and snapped at Lestrade’s right boot. Hardly surprising as it was up the animal’s nostril at the time.

  ‘Er . . . very well.’ Daubney accepted and drew his sword.

  Lestrade tried to do likewise but the sword knot twisted itself round his fingers and he dropped it.

  ‘Corporal,’ he shouted over his shoulder, for he could not turn the horse again, ‘how’s your tent-pegging?’

  The astonished NCO urged his horse forward.

  ‘Not bad, sir,’ he saluted.

  ‘There you go, then.’ Lestrade pointed to the sword as quickly as he could before gripping the pommel again. His knuckles showed white even through the brown hogskin of his gloves, ‘just a little test we give them in the Duke of Lancaster’s,’ he muttered to Daubney.

  ‘Ah, very good. Very good. Yes. Well, double up, corporal.’

  The NCO wheeled his mount’s head and cantered some yards from the troop. To the encouraging shouts of the men, he galloped forward, crouching low over the horse’s neck, and then suddenly straightening as he thundered past Lestrade, threw the sword to him. With a dexterity which surprised him, the inspector-turned-lieutenant caught the thing, albeit by the blade, and he bit his tongue to avoid crying out.

  ‘Smartly done, corporal,’ he winced.

  ‘B Troop,’ shouted Daubney. ‘Threes right,’ and the bugle call ordered the turn.

  ‘Guest of honour ahead,’ Daubney called, ‘on the rostrum with the colonel. Close order formation. The troop will advance. Walk. March. Trot.’

  Lestrade was still trying to slope his sword as Daubney had when he felt the horses of the first rank crash into his rear. Minnie bucked and lashed out with his hind hoofs and there was a moment of panic. It was doubly unfortunate that the guest of honour on the rostrum with the colonel was Sir George Wombwell, Bt., very late of the Seventeenth Lancers, who had ridden down the Valley of Death with the Gallant Six Hundred. The old baronet’s eyes narrowed in the frosty air as B Troop advanced with the rattle of sabres.

  ‘Who’s that on the black?’ he asked Lord Bolton.

  ‘Chap from the Duke of Lancaster’s, George,’ the colonel told him. ‘Name of Spinster.’

  ‘Damned curious name,’ Wombwell observed.

  ‘Damned curious rider,’ Bolton commented.

  ‘Rides like a bloody policeman,’ Wombwell ventured.

  ‘Well, that’s the Duke of Lancaster’s for you. Frank Ellesmere never was much of a judge of men.’

  And Lestrade whirled past them, clinging on for dear life, the blunt side of the sword blade wearing a distinct groove in his shoulder.

  HAD ANYONE TOLD LESTRADE how good a bath under canvas could be, he would not have believed them. He smelt of horses, his legs wobbled, his backside felt like a hedgehog that had recently met a steamroller. Half of his right glove had gone, along with his leather sword knot, for Lestrade had not heeded the sergeant major’s advice and his right protect had been a fraction late. Minnie would have swallowed his hand as well had not Lestrade dropped his sword entirely and, without being asked, the talented corporal of B Troop had raced to the rescue, leaned out over his saddle and flicked the weapon up from the ground.

  Now, at last, Lestrade could soak his cares away and slowly the feeling in his body came back to him.

  ‘Champagne, Lister?’ the adjutant popped his head around the tent flap.

  ‘Er . . . thank you.’

  Lestrade had to confess to himself he had never drunk champagne in the bath before. Or perhaps this was the new Martini the other officers had been talking about. The adjutant popped his cork and Lestrade saw his chance to pop some questions.

  ‘Tell me about Captain Hellerslyke,’ he said.

  ‘Willie?’ Daubney pulled up a camp stool and straddled it. Lestrade couldn’t see how the man’s buttocks coped at all. ‘Why do you ask?’ He poured Lestrade a glass.

  ‘I think I met him once. At Lady . . .’ and he drowned the fictitious name in the bubbles as he sipped.

  ‘Would that have been in Southport, I wonder?’

  ‘Very possibly,’ bluffed Lestrade, desperately trying to recreate the relevant atlas page in the curling steam.

  ‘He had a villa at Southport. And another at Scarborough.’

  ‘Did you know him well?’

  ‘Not really. We shot together a few times, but essentially it was only at Camp we met. You know how things are in the Yeomanry . . .’ and he guffawed, slapping his knee.

  ‘Rather!’ Lestrade guffawed too, but in trying to slap his knee soaked them both. ‘Sorry.’

  ‘You were at the funeral, weren’t you?’

  ‘Thought I ought. Joining a chap’s unit for a few days and so on. Least I could do.’ He was starting to enjoy the plum which was rolling around in his mouth. He almost sounded genteel in a proletarian sort of way.

  ‘Fine show. Did you enjoy your ride today?’

  ‘Marvellous,’ Lestrade lied, ‘marvellous. They’re a fine body of men.’

  ‘The best,’ he said. ‘You’ve nothing like them your side of the Pennines, eh?’

  Lestrade guffawed again. His jaw was starting to feel like his arse.

  ‘I hear Hellerslyke died rather oddly.’

  ‘Damned oddly.’ Daubney glanced around, then crouched over the soaking man. ‘Foul play, of course.’

  ‘No!’ Lestrade did his best to look horrified.

  ‘Police were called in.’

  ‘Local chaps?’

  ‘Some idiot called Blue. If you ask me, they should have sent for the Yard.�
�

  ‘Yard?’ Lestrade played the ignorant. He’d had years of experience.

  ‘Scotland Yard.’

  ‘Ah, yes, of course. Any good, are they?’

  ‘Well, there is one chap I’ve heard of. Have you ever read any of those tales of that Sherlock Holmes chappie?’

  ‘One or two,’ Lestrade lied.

  ‘Who wrote those, now? I’m no good on novelists.’

  ‘Er . . . Conan Doyle, wasn’t it?’

  ‘That’s right. Conan Doyle. Well, he uses this chappie I’m thinking of.’

  ‘Oh?’ Lestrade’s ego began to soar.

  ‘Of course, typical of damned novelists, he does the policeman down.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes. Makes him out to be a useless boundah, always getting the wrong man and so on. Ludicrous! Now, what was his name?’

  ‘Er . . . Lestrade or something, wasn’t it?’

  ‘That’s right. Well, I happen to know he’s a really first-class chap.’

  ‘Indeed?’ Lestrade began to twirl his unwaxed moustache.

  ‘And I happen to know something else. Lestrade is only a nom de crime, as it were.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Yes. His real name’s Abberline. He’s the pride of the Yard!’

  Lestrade choked on his champagne.

  ‘Steady, Lister. Hate to see you go the way old Willie did!’

  ‘How . . .’ Lestrade’s screech took a little while to find its level, ‘how did he go, in fact?’

  ‘Well.’ Daubney topped up their glasses. ‘It was Lady Day.’

  ‘Lady Day?’

  ‘Oh, sorry. A custom we have here in the Yorkshire Hussars. Twice during the month of manoeuvres we have a sort of open day – Lady Day because the ladies, wives, sweethearts and so on, are allowed to visit. We had a splendid luncheon in the marquee. Colonel was in fine form, pinching posteriors and so on. Well, that’s the old man for you.’

  ‘And Hellerslyke?’

  ‘His usual self. At least he was until . . .’

  ‘Yes?’ Lestrade sat upright in the frothy water.