That night, having left the sleeping hotel in the capable hands of Mr Potts, the night porter, Frank followed Bess up to their small suite of rooms. ‘What did Henry mean today, when he said stay away from Hawksley and his daughter?’ Frank asked, climbing into bed.
Bess, having already settled down for the night, turned over and pushed herself up on her elbows. She looked at her husband and felt her cheeks flush. ‘I did something stupid today, Frank.’ She bit her bottom lip. ‘I went to David Sutherland’s funeral.’
‘I know.’
‘You know? But how?’ Bess demanded. ‘Did Henry tell you?’
‘No. I followed you.’ Bess shot Frank a look of disbelief. She was about to ask him why he had done such an untrusting thing, but he answered her before she could formulate the words. ‘To make sure you didn’t get into trouble.’
‘But the abattoir?’ Mimicking Bess, Frank pretended to be shy and bit his lip the way Bess had done. ‘You didn’t go to the abattoir, did you? You are as bad as me, Frank Donnelly!’
Bess leaned into her husband and kissed him. ‘I do love you, Frank,’ she said, wriggling down in the bed and wrapping her arms around him.
‘And I love you, Bess,’ her husband said, lifting her body to his.
CHAPTER FIVE
Lowarth police station, the police house where McGann and his family lived, and the Magistrates’ Court, had been built in an oddly shaped triangular block. Surrounding a courtyard, the narrow building looked as if it had been squeezed in between the Leicester Road and the Gilmorton Road. It consisted of the main door to the police station - with a window on either side - that faced down Market Street, the police house that looked onto Lower Leicester Road - and the public entrance to the Magistrates Court on Gilmorton Road. Bess suspected there were cells there too. Not to imprison criminals long term, but holding cells to keep prisoners in until they came up before the Bench.
Lowarth Magistrates’ Court was held on Thursdays. According to Elsie Bramley, Foxden Hotel’s housekeeper who was in charge of the domestic staff, the public gallery was always full. She knew this because her day off was Thursday and she was a regular attendee.
Bess and Margot sat in the narrow corridor outside Sergeant McGann’s office waiting for him to return from the railway station where, according to Constable Peg, he had been ordered to collect a detective inspector from the Metropolitan Police in London. ‘And he is not best pleased,’ the constable said.
‘How do you feel about working with a policeman from London, Constable?’ Bess asked.
‘I’m looking forward to it. I don’t want to work in Lowarth all my life, like Sergeant McGann. Nothing against Lowarth, like, but if I stay here I won’t get promotion until the sergeant retires - or dies.’ The constable’s face coloured. ‘I didn’t mean…’
‘We know what you meant,’ Bess said, smiling at him reassuringly. ‘And what does Sergeant McGann think about a detective inspector coming up from London?’
The constable shrugged his shoulders. ‘I bet he’s seething,’ Margot said. ‘Go on, you can tell us. We won’t say anything, will we Bess?’
‘Ignore my sister, Constable Peg, she’s being nosey.’
‘Mrs Burrell’s right.’ The young policeman looked nervously over his shoulder at the door. ‘He’s fuming,’ he whispered, conspiratorially. ‘When the Metropolitan Police telephoned to say they were sending someone up to take over the Sutherland case, Sergeant McGann straight-way rang the Chief Constable. He told the chief that sending someone up from London was as good as telling the people of Lowarth that his superiors had no confidence in him. He said it sounded as if they didn’t think he was capable of dealing with a drowning.’
‘I don’t like the man, but I can imagine how he feels,’ Bess said.
‘And military intelligence is sending someone up too. The sergeant called him a pen-pusher, a bloody conchie, who most likely sat in an office while our brave boys fought for their country.’
‘Which of the armed forces did Sergeant McGann serve in?’ Bess asked.
‘He didn’t. How he tells it, he was too young to fight in the first war, and too old to fight in the last one.’
Margot looked at Bess, her face like thunder. Bess moved her head slightly from left to right, to warn her sister not to react. Margot smiled through gritted teeth. ‘Between them, the policeman from London and the man from the military might bring your boss down a peg or two. The arrogant B,’ she said under her breath.
‘How much longer are we going to have to wait? If neither Sergeant McGann, or the DI from London are here, it’s pointless us being here.’
‘Shouldn’t be long now, Miss.’ The bell on the counter in the police station dinged and the constable left, gesturing that he’d be back.
‘Fancy McGann calling Henry a conchie. Ignorant bugger.’
‘I’d like to be a fly on the wall when McGann finds out the military man is Henry Green, the local butcher’s son, born and bred in Lowarth.’ Bess looked at Margot and they both burst out laughing.
‘Quiet! I can hear voices,’ Margot said. The door at the end of the corridor opened and a man in his mid-fifties, about six feet tall and well-built, with fair, greying hair, breezed in smiling. Behind him, looking as if he
