Lovers Meeting by Irene Carr Page B

nothing. He inherited all his money from an uncle up North. There’s a son, Hubert, but he’s out in Monte Carlo at the moment and I’ve never seen him. Daisy’s been here donkey’s years and she knows him. She says he spends most of his time in France and talks the lingo like a native. A French chef told her that. He came here one night to cook for a special do and him and this Hubert rattled away at each other.’ He squinted blearily at Josie. ‘And Daisy says they can’t keep a young girl here long on account of Hubert, so you be warned. He won’t worry me. I’ve only had this job a month and I’m on the lookout for another.’ But he couldn’t look Josie in the eye when he said this and she suspected he knew he would have trouble finding another post.
    But Josie told herself she had a roof over her head, the food was reasonably good and she was being paid £24 a year. It was better than walking the streets looking for work. She tried to settle in but after a month there came news that made her uneasy. Pilling said, ‘We’re moving up north for a few months. She wants to live in the country place the old feller left. All the toffs go off to the country in August but they go to shoot or hunt. She’s going just to imitate them. But if she’s hoping to go to the hunt ball she’ll be disappointed.’ He laughed raucously.
    Josie did not want to go. When she learned that the house was only a mile or two outside Sunderland she almost gave in her notice. But then she told herself to be sensible. She need not go to the town. On the rare occasions she could be spared from her duties she could probably visit Newcastle or Durham. And she did not want to look for a job again so soon. She had saved little and needed a deal more behind her before she left Mrs Smurthwaite. So in August she travelled north.
    She was not alone. Hubert Smurthwaite was returning from Monte Carlo after squandering the money his mother had given him. And Reuben Garbutt was about to exact his revenge on the Langleys.

9
    August 1908
    Reuben Garbutt sat in a pub in Whitechapel and told the villainous man beside him, ‘Get rid of them.’ Then he handed over a fistful of sovereigns and walked out. He had paid for murder. Garbutt was thirty-six years old now, tall, thick-set and powerful, with a square, thin-lipped face and a wide moustache. His dark eyes stared magnetically and he was attractive to women. He knew this and used them.
    He was now an apparently legitimate businessman with interests in jewellery shops, property and a transport company, one of the first to use a large number of the new motor lorries. He had an office in the City and a London home in St John’s Wood. He looked the part in a check morning-coat suit that fitted him perfectly, over a single-breasted waistcoat, a shirt with a high collar and a silk tie. His bowler hat had a curly brim, his gloves were a soft kid and his valet had polished his shoes until they glittered.
    In truth he could have succeeded honestly because he had a flair for spotting a business opportunity. But crime was in his nature so he prospered from his activities in theft, receiving, extortion, blackmail and fraud. He had murdered in his time but now he used paid assassins.
    He took a cab to King’s Cross station and then boarded a train to Sunderland. There he hired another cab to take him to Owen Packer’s office. There were a number of brass plates outside the door because Packer dabbled in various agencies, one being insurance and another, shipping coal. The plate for the latter read: ‘Coal Carriers Ltd.’ But the one above stated: ‘Owen Packer. Solicitor.’ That was his profession. He was skinny and cadaverous with a drooping moustache and yellow teeth shown in a perpetual smirk. Some years before he had successfully defended a criminal working for Garbutt. The villain, charged with robbery with violence, got off when Packer bribed a prosecution witness to change his testimony. Garbutt