The Kill Fee Read online

  Felix clapped. “Give the prize to the little blonde lady. Yes, Poppy; it was my aunt. I retrieved the gun from Selena and slipped it into my aunt’s evening bag. She and her sister were the only people who were not searched. Afterwards I told her about it and wisely she has kept it all to herself. Selena had missed Safin and injured a British guard instead. The Brits would not have taken too kindly to that, and our position here as guests of the Queen Mother is tenuous at best.”

  Felix stood up and stubbed out his cigarette. “And now, Andrei, I would like to have that key.” He reached out his hand.

  “You have the key?” Poppy asked Nogovski.

  Nogovski looked around at the four other people seated at the table. “What assurances do I have that you will return the key to the empress and that the contents of that egg will never see the light of day?”

  “You will just have to trust me, dear cousin,” Felix purred.

  “That’s the last thing I will ever do.” Quick as a flash, Nogovski was out of his chair and the prince was thrust against a wall with his throat held in a vice-like grip. One false move and Nogovski would crush his windpipe. “Poppy,” he said, over his shoulder. “My shoe. Twist the right heel and it will open.”

  Daniel reached out to hold her back, but she sidestepped him and got down on her knees. Nogovski raised his heel to give her access. She gripped the leather and twisted to left and right, and sure enough the heel turned and out dropped a tiny key on a silver chain.

  “Have you got it?” asked Nogovski.

  “I have,” said Poppy.

  “Then get the map and burn it,” ordered Nogovski. Felix tried to protest but was silenced.

  Poppy knew that it was the right thing to do. Too many people had already died. It was the only thing that would prevent the incendiary information – whatever it was – getting into the wrong hands. So, with her friends huddled round her, she searched the egg until she found a tiny hole. She inserted the key, turned it and a little trapdoor in the purple lacquer clicked open. Her heart pounding, she felt around inside until her fingers found a folded piece of parchment. This is it, she thought as she pincered it between middle and forefinger, and withdrew it. It lay on the table before them.

  “Shouldn’t we look at it first?” asked Delilah.

  “No,” said Poppy. “The less we know the better.” She reached for the lighter and lit the corner of the map. It took just an instant to disintegrate.

  “You’re a fool, Nogovski, a fool,” croaked Felix.

  “Let him go now, Andrei,” said Poppy. It was the first time she had called him by his first name. “I’m sure the prince will be only too pleased to negotiate our release with the Captain of the Guard, particularly if he doesn’t want certain – how should we say? – compromising facts getting into the morning edition.”

  Nogovski chuckled and released his hold. “Of course, Miss Denby. Your wish is my command.”

  CHAPTER 38

  Poppy and Daniel sat in The Globe’s Model T Ford outside an address in Battersea. It was Friday, three days since the drama at Kensington Palace had unfolded.

  After Felix had arranged their release, in the wee hours of Wednesday morning, they had all returned to Adam’s apartment – the closest address – to crash. Fuelled by a few hours’ sleep and a hearty breakfast, Poppy and Daniel had gone into the office, leaving Adam and Delilah still asleep in bed.

  Andrei Nogovski had set up a meeting with Marjorie Reynolds and DCI Jasper Martin on Wednesday afternoon, and saw them under the protection of the British Secret Service. What went on at that meeting Poppy had no idea, but the net result was the release of Oscar, the temporary closure of the Russian embassy and the arrest of Vasili Safin as he tried to flee the country.

  It was also agreed – after discussions with Felix Yusopov and Yasmin Reece-Lansdale – that no charge of theft was to be laid against Adam Lane, because he had returned the egg to its rightful owner. The foreign charges, which Interpol was investigating, were being dealt with by Yasmin, who now represented Adam, as well as the Yusopovs, Oscar and Rollo in their various predicaments. Poppy doubted the solicitor would be on DCI Martin’s Christmas card list this year.

  After Poppy and Daniel had filled Rollo in on everything that had happened, Rollo told them what he had found out from Ivan. It seems that he was indeed Vasili Safin’s mole at The Globe, but Ivan claimed he had only done it because the Russian ambassador had said he had information about his family that he would trade for inside tips. And yes, Ivan had sent the chocolates to Selena, but he swore he knew nothing about the poison. However, he thought Safin probably did, because the ambassador had been the one to suggest the switch in the first place. Poppy had asked Marjorie to arrange for the fingerprints of the “unknown person” to be checked against Safin’s. And, unsurprisingly, they matched.

  After Rollo had taken down Poppy’s story, agreeing for now to be vague about Adam’s involvement and also the exact nature of the empress’s role, he asked whether there would be a kill fee in the offing from the Romanovs. She said she had no idea, but hoped he would simply do the right thing. “I gave them my word,” said Poppy.

  Rollo looked at her with a twinkle in his eye and said: “Well, that was rather silly, wasn’t it? I’ll get Yasmin to thrash out the details with them later. I refuse to sit on all of this, Miz Denby; it’s far too good a story.”

  Poppy couldn’t deny that at all. However, the best part of it was what Nogovski had told her on the way back from the palace on Wednesday morning: Sergei Andreiovich’s daughter and her nanny, Ruth Broadwood, were alive and well, and living at an address south of the river. Nogovski had smuggled them out of Yekaterinburg eighteen months earlier and had been keeping them, under house arrest, in London, until the Fabergé egg containing the map had been found. Now that it had there was no reason not to let them go.

  And so here they were on Friday morning. Nogovski and Ivan knocked on the door while Poppy and Daniel waited for them in the motor.

  “Do you think she’ll recognize her father?” asked Poppy. “It’s been what, six years since she saw him?”

  “I don’t know. But he’ll recognize her. A father will never forget his child,” said Daniel. He put his arm around Poppy and they waited for the door to be answered. It didn’t take long. A man first, whom Nogovski spoke to briefly, then a woman. Poppy sucked in her breath: it was Ruth Broadwood. The elderly woman looked healthy, and happy to see her visitors. She went back into the house and a few moments later returned with a young girl and, at her heels, a little brown dog. The child looked up at the two men inquisitively. Then Ivan reached down and swept his daughter into his arms.

  “I think it’s time you met my two,” said Daniel, and pulled Poppy closer to him.

  “Perhaps it is,” said Poppy, wiping away a tear.

  THE WORLD OF POPPY DENBY:A HISTORICAL NOTE ON THE KILL FEE

  I got the idea for The Kill Fee through a confluence of events and coincidences. After finishing book 1 in the series, The Jazz Files, I was doing some background reading to see what historical events might form the backdrop for Poppy’s next adventure. I considered taking her to Egypt, so she could get caught up in the intrigue surrounding the discovery of King Tutankhamun’s tomb; but that took place in 1922, so was too far in the future.

  So what was happening in the autumn of 1920? The event that attracted me the most was the end of the Russian Civil War. But how to tie this in to our Poppy in London…? Three things happened: first, I was reading a fantastic book called The Russian Court at Sea, by Frances Welch (Short Books, 2011), about the rescue of Empress Maria Federovna and the surviving Romanovs. In 1919 they were picked up in Yalta by the British warship HMS Marlborough and taken to Malta. Now Malta, as fans of the Poppy Denby Investigates series know, is where Delilah Marconi’s father lives. So immediately my ears pricked up. From Malta they were then brought to London. The empress lived for a while with her sister in Kensington Palace, but then, like most of the other
exiled Romanovs, she moved on. She died in Denmark in 1928, still in the firm belief that her son Nicholas and his family were alive.

  The year 1919 was a bit too early for my timeframe, but I skirt over this in The Kill Fee by having them in the country for “some months” at the start of the story. In reality they landed on British shores in late May 1919.

  So I knew I wanted to have the Romanovs in exile as part of my story, but I was not yet sure of the plot. Then, with a phrase from Welch’s book – “rolled-up Rembrandts and Fabergé eggs” – on my mind, I came across an article about a man in America who had bought what he thought was a replica Fabergé egg at a junk sale only to discover, ten years later, it was the genuine article and worth twenty million pounds! The day after I read this article I came across my own Fabergé egg in an Oxfam charity shop in Newcastle upon Tyne. This was most definitely a cheap imitation – the silver paint was already peeling off – but the coincidence was remarkable. I bought the egg for ten pounds, brought it home and started plotting my novel.

  A few other deliberate tweaks to the historical timeline have taken place. First, the Russian embassy didn’t move to Kensington Gardens until 1927 – previously it was in Belgravia. But I needed it there to allow Poppy and her friends to flee to the palace on foot. A second known anachronism is the selling of the paper poppies. These were launched by the British Legion in 1921 – but I have brought it forward a year to allow for the character of Sarge, and to give Poppy an opportunity to remember her brother and remind readers of the shadow of the war, which plays such a big part in the first book in the series, The Jazz Files.

  Apart from that, as far as I am aware, I have stuck strictly to the historical timeline; from what music was played at the time to the fashion designers who were in vogue. I’m sure you will forgive me for the few deliberate “adjustments” I made for the sake of the story – and for any unintentional errors you may find on the way.

  Finally, before I am accused of character assassination, a few words on the Yusopovs. Felix Yusopov was indeed one of the murderers of Gregori Rasputin. The “mad monk” was killed in the hope that, out of his thrall, the tsarina Alexandra would be open to influence her husband towards reform. Sadly, she did not.

  Yusopov and his wife did travel with the empress on HMS Marlborough, along with their young daughter. The family moved to Paris from London in 1920 and set up a couture house. As far as I know, they had absolutely nothing to do with the theft of Fabergé eggs – or anything else! Neither did the empress. This plotline – as well as the exhibition at the Crystal Palace – is purely a figment of my imagination. This is, after all, a novel, not a history textbook. And I do hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it and will be eagerly awaiting Poppy’s next adventure.

  FOR FURTHER READING:

  Visit www.poppydenby.com for more historical information on the period, gorgeous pictures of 1920s fashion and décor, audio and video links to 1920s music and news clips, a link to the author’s website, as well as news about upcoming titles in the Poppy Denby Investigates series.

  Shepherd, Janet and John Shepherd, 1920s Britain, Oxford: Shire Living Histories, Shire Publications, 2010.

  Shrimpton, Jayne, Fashion in the 1920s, Oxford: Shire Publications, 2013.

  Taylor, D.J., Bright Young People: The rise and fall of a generation 1918–1940, London: Vintage, Random House, 2008.

  Waugh, Evelyn, Vile Bodies, London: Chapman and Hall, 1930.

  Waugh, Evelyn, Scoop, (1938) London: Penguin Classics, Penguin, 2000.

  Welch, Frances, The Russian Court at Sea, London: Short Books, 2011.

  For more information and fun photos about Poppy and her world go to: www.poppydenby.com