Page 3 of The Cursed Writer
Harry sat at her desk for quite some time, staring at the rectangular telegram without truly seeing it. Her thoughts were jumbled – mostly focused on Bobby’s revelation about the poor woman who had paid the price for Simeon Pemberton’s lustfulness. Would he risk attempting to seduce another of the bank’s employees? It seemed likely, although the fact that Harry was still a member of staff might help to deter him. Should she have spoken up instead of meekly accepting her demotion? If she had, it was likely both she and the other secretary would be unemployed. But perhaps so would Mr Pemberton. Was that a sacrifice Harry ought to have made?
Still troubled, she turned her attention to the telegram, hoping it might distract her. The message was shorter than the previous one and contained only four words.
GARSTON CLUB. TOMORROW. 5P.M.
Harry sat back in her chair. She had hoped Archer might give more information about why he sought the help of any detective, let alone Holmes, but he had only deepened the mystery.Rather than satisfy her curiosity, the imperious summons to the Garston Club in Piccadilly only fanned the flames of her interest; if such a telegram had arrived at 221B Baker Street in a Conan Doyle story, Holmes would undoubtedly have been similarly intrigued, which she supposed might have been Archer’s intention. The trouble was that Harry could not go to the meeting – not as Harry White, nor using the pseudonym of R.K. Moss, the name she had invented for the secretary of Sherlock Holmes. She could not go because she was a woman, and under the Garston Club’s archaic but inflexible rules, women were expressly forbidden to enter.
It boasted an impressive list of members, Harry knew; her two elder brothers had both undergone the strict vetting process to join the ranks of well-known actors, authors, artists and aristocrats who met there. The fact that this John Archer was also a member only increased Harry’s puzzlement. If the grand-sounding address of Thrumwell Manor had not signalled he was a man of some importance, his membership of the Garston Club made it clear, and once again, Harry found herself wondering what he hoped to gain by contacting Holmes.
But it appeared the pieces of the puzzle would only be revealed in full by meeting him and that was what frustrated Harry the most. Could she send a telegram requesting an alternative venue? Archer might very well do it, for the great Sherlock Holmes, but it would mean the arrival of yet another telegram at the bank, which would raise still more questions in the post room, and Harry would rather not undergo another interrogation from Bobby. Tapping her fingers thoughtfully on the desk, she considered the problem. What would Holmes do, if he were in her shoes? The answer was obvious and offered no help at all: he would simply meet Archer at the Garston Club, because he could go anywhere and do anything, by virtue of being a man. Moreover, he had Sir Arthur Conan Doyleto remove such inconveniences with a clever sentence or two. Harry had no such advantages. She would have to decline the meeting and hope Archer did not decide to present himself at 221B Baker Street, demanding to see the detective in person. He might even produce the telegram she had sent on behalf of Holmes, which while laughable might also set alarm bells ringing among those who knew the bank did indeed employ a secretary to Sherlock Holmes. There was, in short, a risk that the trail might lead back to Harry and she would find it extremely difficult to explain the coincidence away. And it was a scenario she felt all the more likely to occur if she did not cancel the meeting and no one turned up to meet Archer at the Garston Club. Harry rubbed her temples, wincing as her fingers brushed the bruises that were a souvenir of her desperate chase through London a few days earlier. She was beginning to regret following the impulse to reply to Archer at all.
Harry did her best to focus on her work but, as the afternoon wore on, the problem gnawed at her. The unpredictability of what might unfold if she followed either course of action troubled her; both carried risk and she couldn’t settle on the best path. But eventually, she decided with regret that the meeting must be cancelled, and in such a way that it was clear that no further correspondence would be undertaken. It was, she thought, something of a shame not to learn more about Mr Archer’s problem, but there was no help for that. She could not meet him, yet couldn’t chance going. The only way to nullify the danger was draw a line under the matter entirely.
She remained convinced of this as she made her way once more to the post office and copied the message she had composed onto the telegram form.
Regret unable to help. Matter now closed. S.H.
Her determination did not waver as she joined the queue, which was longer than it had been the day before and slow moving. Harry allowed her mind to drift, studying the other customers to pass the time. The woman directly before her was clearly impatient, tapping a well-heeled shoe and huffing. From the back, Harry guessed she might be in her forties; her coiled hair was shot with grey. A fellow secretary, she decided, impatient to complete her errand and be away home. The man ahead of her was tall and smartly dressed in a pinstripe suit, with a dark grey trilby hat that covered most of his head. He carried himself stiffly, with two brown paper packages under one arm, leaning heavily on a mahogany walking stick. Perhaps a war veteran, Harry thought, watching him move slowly forwards in the queue.
Holmes would know from his gait exactly which part of his leg had been injured, and from that deduce which of the armed forces he had served in. There would be some other barely perceptible clue that told him where the man had served. But for Harry, who had no superhuman intellect to rely on, there were no such remarkable revelations. She might not even be correct in assuming he had been injured in the Great War – his disability could have been caused by a car crash, a workplace accident, a debilitating illness – but she thought there was something military in his straight back and proud bearing.
And then he turned his head to the left, only a little, and she caught the unnatural curve of a smooth, hard cheek. It was painted to mimic the colour of the man’s skin tone but somehow that only made it more obvious to Harry. The breath caught in her throat as she hurriedly looked away, feeling suddenly intrusive. So many men had returned from the war horrifically disfigured and not all were able to face the world again, even with metal masks to hide the damage or skin grafts to try and repair it. That this man could was a testament tocourage. She watched him turn to face the front, noting how many of those around him averted their gaze. Such men were undoubted heroes, but, even fourteen years on, they were also an uncomfortable reminder of the terrible cost the war had exacted. A price some would continue to pay for the rest of their lives.
The queue moved again, although not fast enough for the woman in front of Harry, who muttered under her breath. The man with the walking stick shuffled forward but seemed to get his cane tangled with his foot. He stumbled, throwing his arms wide in an attempt to regain his balance, and the packages he carried tumbled to the ground. The secretary tutted loudly, making no move to help. ‘Really.’
Harry’s cheeks began to burn with indignation. She stepped past the woman and flashed a smile at the man, who was trying with some difficulty to recover his parcels. ‘Here. Let me.’
Once she had scooped them up, she held them out, allowing him to gather them awkwardly under his free arm. She looked fully at him then, saw that the metal mask extended across more than half his face, covering both eyes and the whole of one cheek. It disappeared beneath his hat and Harry supposed the trilby must be helping to keep it in place. His eyes were dark behind the holes but they fixed on Harry and she thought he was trying to return her smile, although his mouth barely twitched. ‘Thank you,’ he said, the words a little indistinct.
‘That’s quite all right,’ Harry replied. ‘Will you be able to manage? I can help, if you’d like.’
Fresh tutting broke out behind them. ‘Don’t think you’re jumping the queue, miss,’ the secretary said, and Harry looked back to see a hard-faced woman whose expression was even more sour than her tone. ‘I know your game.’
Harry lifted her chin. ‘My game, as you put it, is helping this gentleman. Nothing more.’
The other woman scowled. ‘Just as long as you remember your place. It’s behind me.’ She jerked her head at the man. ‘He can join you there if he needs help.’
Drawing a deep, calming breath, Harry summoned up a cool smile. ‘That won’t be necessary.’ She turned her attention back to the man, who had been following the exchange in silence. ‘I’m happy to carry your parcels to the counter. It’s no trouble.’
She sensed rather than saw his indecision and thought she understood. It was probably pride, mingled with a reluctance to draw attention to himself, doing battle with the inconvenience of grappling with the two packages and his walking stick. But it appeared practicality won, because he nodded. ‘Thank you. That would help.’
‘See?’ The secretary raised her voice as Harry took the parcels back. ‘What did I tell you? She’s trying to jump the queue.’
The unfairness of the accusation nettled Harry. Without stopping to think, she held up her telegram form and tore it in half, then again and again. She crumpled the pieces in the palm of her hand. ‘There,’ she said to the scowling woman. ‘Now I have no business at the counter so I can’t possibly be pushing in.’
For a moment, she thought her adversary might argue but she merely pressed her lips together and glared. Deciding the battle had been won, Harry turned to face forwards and waited in silence beside the man. When the queue moved, she kept pace with him, noting that his movements were much easier without the packages to hamper him. As they reached the counter, she slid the brown paper parcels across to the clerk and glanced at her companion. ‘You’ll be fine now.’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Thank you.’
‘My pleasure,’ Harry said, and resisted the temptation to look at the woman behind them. ‘Cheerio, then.’
Still holding the fragments of the telegram form, she made for the back of the queue, which now snaked almost out of thedoor. She bit her lip. If she joined the queue now, there was no guarantee she would reach the front before the counter closed and she didn’t want the man with the walking stick to notice and realise he had inconvenienced her. More than that, Harry was loath to give the sour-faced woman the satisfaction of knowing she had cost her the place. Yet her message to John Archer must be delivered. Disaster would follow if it were not. And then a flash of inspiration struck her – she could telephone Thrumwell Manor once she arrived home, and leave word for Archer that Holmes was unable to help. It was not perhaps quite as official as a telegram, but it would get the message across.
Thrusting the torn-up paper into the pocket of her coat, Harry hurried out of the post office. But as she made her way along Baker Street, it occurred to her that using her own telephone was not perhaps wise. Mr Archer might very well try to call Holmes back, and the local switchboard operator would be able to locate the number Harry had called from. It was better to use one of the red and white public telephone booths that were dotted around London’s streets, she decided. The nearest she remembered seeing was on Marylebone Road, a short walk from Baker Street. Harry made her way there.
‘Directory Enquiries, how may I help?’ The voice was so crisp and efficient that it caused Harry to hesitate, if only briefly.
‘Mr John Archer, Thrumwell Manor, please,’ she replied, with as much confidence as she could muster. The Directory Enquiries service had only been introduced earlier that year and Harry hadn’t needed to use it until now. Would they really be able to find the correct John Archer and put her through without knowing the number?
