Death and the Arrow (5 page)

THE ARROW COFFEE HOUSE

The clientele of the Arrow coffee house was not as distinguished as that of The Quill; in fact, several of the faces that turned to greet them as they stepped inside would not have looked out of place in the Condemned Hold in Newgate, and Tom was glad to see that Dr. Harker was carrying a sword as well as a cane.

There was a furnace of a fire in the hearth and yet the room still seemed damp. The stone-flagged floor had a greenish tinge, and the plaster walls were cracked and stained. The ceiling was low and made even lower by massive oak beams.

They sat down at an empty table next to the bow window and Dr. Harker raised his hand for some service. A tall woman crossed the room and bid them good day. The bottom of her dress was tattered and damp where it had brushed the slimy floor.

“Well now, gentlemen, what’s it to be?” she said with a crooked smile, her face whiter than her teeth.

“I shall have a coffee, and my friend here will have—”

“I should like a coffee also, Dr. Harker,” interrupted Tom.

Dr. Harker smiled. “Very well, then. Two coffees, my good woman.”

“Two coffees it is, then, gents.”

When she returned with the drinks, Dr. Harker blocked her path back to the counter. “Tell me,” he said, “do I have the honor of speaking to Mrs. Leech?”

Her smile disappeared and was replaced by an expression more fitting to the face. “Who wants to know?”

“Forgive me,” said Dr. Harker, getting to his feet. “My name is Dr. Josiah Harker and my friend here is Thomas Marlowe. May we offer our condolences on the untimely death of your son.”

“You knew my Bill?” said the woman, looking them up and down. “That don’t seem likely, now, does it?”

“I can see you are a woman of great intelligence, and so I will get to the point.” Dr. Harker pulled back a chair. “Please, won’t you join us? We will, of course, pay for your time.” He produced a small velvet bag and tipped out a pile of silver coins.

“Very well, then,” said Mrs. Leech, sitting down and grabbing the coins. “Spit it out. I ain’t got all day. Sarah,” she shouted, “bring us some brandy!”

“Mr. Marlowe and I are seeking information. We are trying to identify the murderer of a friend of ours.”

“Was he shot by an arrow an’ all, then?” said Mrs. Leech, taking the bottle from the serving girl and pouring herself a drink.

“No, no, he was not. But he did have the card—the Death and the Arrow card.”

Mrs. Leech took a generous gulp of brandy and stifled a sob. “That damned card. I wish they’d never showed me it—it still gives me the shivers.” Tom knew exactly what she meant, and he smiled at her in sympathy. Suddenly her face seemed to mellow a little. “Look, I know he wasn’t what you might call a
good
man, my Bill, but he was a proper son to me all the same.”

“I’m sure he loved you very much,” said Dr. Harker. Mrs. Leech drained her cup and poured another. “That he did, Dr. Harker, that he did.”

“Do you think his death might have something to do with the coffee house?” asked Tom.

“The coffee house?” said Mrs. Leech, looking suspicious once more.

“What with it being called The Arrow, I mean,” said Tom. He looked at Dr. Harker for support, but Dr. Harker’s face was expressionless and his eyes were fixed on Mrs. Leech.

“Oh, that,” she said, wringing her hands and trying to force a smile. “It was Bill’s idea. It was his idea of a joke.”

“A joke?” said Dr. Harker.

“Oh,” said Mrs. Leech nervously “I . . . I . . . just . . . Bill laughed at the strangest things. Of course, it wasn’t so funny after all, was it, what with the way he was. . . .” And she drained another cup.

Dr. Harker looked about him. “I have never come across this coffee house, Mrs. Leech. Have you had it long?”

“Not long, no,” she said. “I came into a bit of money a couple of years back. A rich uncle died and didn’t forget his little niece. I was a seamstress down Spitalfields way afore that.” She looked past them with watery eyes. “Matter of fact, I miss it sometimes. It was hard work, but we had a laugh, if you know what I mean. I don’t know as I belong here, if you want to know the truth of it, sirs.”

“Then why—?” began Tom.

“It was Bill’s idea, wasn’t it? And now he’s dead, and I’m stuck here with these miserable so-and-sos. I hope you finds whoever done for Bill—and your friend.” Mrs. Leech got rather shakily to her feet.

“But—” began Tom, about to tell Mrs. Leech that there were
two
murders, but Dr. Harker interrupted.

“It must have come as an awful shock to hear of Bill’s death.”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Leech, wiping away a tear with her handkerchief. “Yes . . . it was. . . .”

“Especially as he was supposed to have been killed two years before—in the selfsame fashion.”

Mrs. Leech looked up slowly from behind her handkerchief. Her eyes were cold and black, her face even whiter than before. “Jake . . . Bull-nose . . . Skinner . . .” Each man rose at his name. “Please show these gentlemen to the door.”

“I have a sword!” said Dr. Harker, rising to his feet, but the men did not seem very impressed. Dr. Harker nudged Tom and started backing toward the door. “We were just leaving, weren’t we, Tom?”

“Y-yes,” said Tom, standing up and joining the doctor.

The two of them edged backward to the door and made a hasty retreat to more familiar territory; they didn’t stop until Tom finally lost the urge to look over his shoulder.

“So, Tom,” said Dr. Harker as they walked through an alleyway near the Strand, “what have we learned today?”

“To carry a loaded pistol?” replied Tom.

Dr. Harker laughed and slapped him on the back. “About the murders, Tom. What have we learned about the murders?”

Tom went over the conversation with Mrs. Leech in his mind, searching in vain for something she had said that they did not already know.

“Tell me, Tom, did she seem like someone who had recently lost a son?” said Dr. Harker.

“Yes,” replied Tom. “I believe she did.”

“I agree, Tom. She may have been lying about the source of her fortune—a rich uncle indeed! — but she was truly grief-stricken. And what does that tell us?”

Tom thought a little and then smiled. “That the first victim
was
Leech.”

“Precisely! And that he died in a courtyard here in London and not in America.”

“But how could such a mistake be made?” asked Tom.

“Oh, I don’t think it was a mistake, Tom. Leech
wanted
to appear dead, I’m sure of that. But why? We need to have a word with the other person who identified Leech.”

“The sergeant,” remembered Tom.

“The very same,” said Dr. Harker. “The sergeant is a link between whatever happened in America and what is happening in our city.”

“Do you think the sergeant might be one of the murderers, Dr. Harker?”

“It’s possible, Tom. If he is not, then he will probably be in fear of his life. And something tells me he will not want to be found. I think we are going to need some help. . . .”

“You certainly are, friend,” said a voice behind them.

Tom and the doctor turned to see a thickset man tapping a cudgel against the flat of his palm.

“I have a sword!” said Dr. Harker.

“D’you hear that, trooper? The gentleman has a sword!”

They turned again to find the way ahead blocked by another man, this one gaunt with wild eyes. His head moved slowly from side to side as he spoke, like a snake about to strike. “Well, ain’t you terrified, trooper?” he called to his cohort.

“To me bones,” said the other. “What about you?”

“Well, now, I ain’t never been feared while I got these here angels to guard me.”

And with that he produced two pistols from his coat pockets and pointed them at Tom and Dr. Harker.

OCEAN CARTER

"Say your prayers, if you’re the praying kind, ’cos you are looking at your last minute on this dung heap,” said their attacker. But he had scarcely finished these words when another man came out from the shadows to stand beside him. The man was holding a white pigeon in his hands, stroking it gently under its beak. It was Ocean Carter.

“Well, well,” he said. “What have we here?”

“Hold it right there,” said the man, turning one of his pistols on Ocean but keeping his eyes on the doctor and Tom. “This is no business of yours.”

“True, true,” said Ocean. “But if it
was,
I find myself wondering how you would stop us all, with only two pistols.”

The man turned to face Ocean for the first time. “Well, since you ask, brother, I would shoot you and the gentleman here, and leave the boy to my colleague.”

“Ah, but what about the pigeon?”

“The pigeon?” he snarled, but just as he did so, Ocean let the bird loose and it flapped in front of the man’s face. In this split second of distraction, Ocean lunged forward, grabbed his arm, and pushed it up. The pistol fired harmlessly up into the sky. In the same instant, he kicked the second pistol from the man’s other hand and sent it clattering across the cobbles. The doctor turned and drew his sword, and the man with the cudgel ran off down the alley. Meanwhile, the other attacker pushed Ocean back and pulled a knife.

“The pistol, Tom,” shouted Ocean. “To me!” Tom darted over, picked up the pistol, and tossed it to Ocean, who caught it, cocked it, and aimed it in one swift movement.

The attacker dropped his knife, opened up his coat, and stuck out his chest, inviting the shot. “Come on, then, bonny lad. Fire away!”

Ocean took aim.

“No!” shouted Dr. Harker.

Their attacker laughed. He bowed to the doctor and walked calmly away. When he was some way off, he turned. “If we meet again, gentlemen, I’ll make you wish you’d pulled that trigger.”

“I already do!” shouted Ocean. A huge bang ripped through the alley and the attacker’s hat flew off. Without stopping to retrieve it, he ran off as fast as his legs would carry him.

“What a shot!” gasped Tom.

“I’m getting old,” said Ocean, putting the smoking pistol inside his coat. “I was aiming for his ear. Come on, gents,” he said, “all this racket will have roused the constables. Time we wasn’t here.”

He led Tom and Dr. Harker briskly down several alleyways, up a curving flight of steps, and through the back of an inn; to their surprise, they emerged into the busy throng of Smithfield, coming to a halt next to a wagon full of fleeces.

“You have our undying gratitude, sir,” said Dr. Harker, shaking Ocean’s hand.

“It was great luck that you happened by,” said Tom.

“Well, not luck exactly, Master Tom,” said Ocean. “The truth is, I’ve been following you gents. I thought I might come in handy and, well, I was right.” He grinned. “No offense intended, of course, but even with that sword, these are dangerous waters you’re paddling in.”

Tom thought he saw the doctor blush slightly at the mention of his sword.

“Ocean is a very unusual name, if you don’t mind me saying,” Dr. Harker said.

“They call me Ocean on account of how I was born at sea; on the Atlantic’s briny deep. I come into this world on a Bristol-bound brig out of the Americas, flapping on the deck like a new-caught codfish. My dear old mother, bless her bones, was returning from those parts, where she’d lately resided, transported there for thievery and the like. Transported there for being poor, if you asks me. Transported there for being born in Shoreditch and not in Mayfair.” Ocean looked away for a moment and then continued. “She died in the having of me, bless her, so I never knew her. I was adopted by another of her kind, who brought me to this city and taught me the craft of thievery. That’s the truth, sir. I am a thief, but I’m an honest thief.” He smiled. “There, now you have my life.”

“And I owe you mine,” said Dr. Harker, shaking his hand. “Ocean, I’m very pleased to renew our acquaintance. And I think we ought to tell you all that we know so far, shouldn’t we, Tom?”

“Yes, sir,” said Tom. “I think we should.”

So Ocean learned of their search for Will’s murderer and what they had discovered so far. He was quick to offer any assistance he could, but he also had a few words of caution. “As you found out,” he told them, “these parts can be a deadly place for them that don’t know their way about. You see the shape of the thieves here? Those villains would have shot you dead and thought no more about it.”

“I don’t think they were thieves, Ocean. Or at least they were not about to steal from
us
.”

“How so?” asked Ocean. “What fight could those men have had with you?”

“I don’t know, Ocean,” said Dr. Harker. “But I’m sure those two men are involved in the Death and the Arrow mystery and in the murder of young Will.”

“God help them if that’s true,” said Ocean. “But there were three men in that alleyway, Dr. Harker.” Tom and the doctor looked at each other in surprise. “Four, if you count the man on the roof.”

“What do you mean?” said Dr. Harker.

“Well, there was a man who didn’t want to be seen, skulking in a doorway some ways off.”

“What did he look like?” said Tom, reminded of the man he saw at Will’s funeral. “Was he a big man, dressed in black?”

“Not so big, no,” said Ocean. “Wiry, I’d call him. Now, the man on the roof—he was big.”

“On the roof, you say?” said Dr. Harker.

“That’s right. Up on the roof, behind the chimney stack. I just caught a fleeting glimpse, mind you, but he was there.”

“But I’ve seen him too,” said Tom, suddenly remembering.

“Really, Tom?” said Dr. Harker excitedly. “Can you remember when?”

“Just after Will told me about his job, I saw someone high up on the roof ridge when there was a break in the fog. Do you think he was following Will? Is he the killer?”

“I don’t know, Tom,” said Dr. Harker, deep in thought. “I don’t know.” He turned to Ocean. “Do you think you can find the men who attacked us?” he asked.

“If they can be found, I’ll find them, rest assured,” said Ocean. “But about this here army sergeant you mentioned—the one that identified the body...”

“Yes?” said Dr. Harker.

“Well, the fact is, I’ve been doing some nosing around myself. A friend told me something of that soldier only this morning.”

“Well, that’s marvelous, Ocean. When can we talk to this friend of yours?”

“Would now be a suitable time?” said Ocean.

“It certainly would,” the doctor replied.

“Then follow me,” said Ocean, and they were off.

Tom and Dr. Harker followed on Ocean’s heels, struggling at times to keep up with him. Both Tom and the doctor prided themselves on knowing London like they knew their own bedchambers, but they soon found they had not the slightest idea where they were. Ocean took them on a trail through backyards and alleyways, never once pausing to check his way. A long flight of green and well-worn steps brought them to a blackened brick archway, and then, all of a sudden, they were in Covent Garden market, the air thick with the smell of lavender and poverty.

Outside the Green Man alehouse was a blind fiddler. Under his tattered hat was a face that had once been handsome; on his back, a moth-eaten coat that had once been the height of fashion. A red-haired boy was bending down to steal the few coins from the pewter dish at his feet when, quick as a whip, the fiddler kicked him soundly on the backside, sending him sprawling across the pavement. Ocean picked the boy up by the scruff of his neck.

“Ocean . . . ,” said the boy, shuffling away, “I didn’t mean no harm.”

“Be off with you, you little tick, before I kick you myself!” With that, the boy scuttled off down the street.

“Ocean!” called the fiddler. “Is that you, my friend?”

“It is, Jacob,” said Ocean. “And I have two friends with me. They seek that soldier-boy you spoke of. They think it might help them find whoever it was that did for Will. Can you tell them what you know?”

“Well,” began the fiddler, “I was south of the river, Southwark ways. I’d had a good day and I dropped into a tavern—The Ten-Killed Cat, they call it—for a drink or two before coming back. That’s when I heard the sergeant. He was as drunk as a watchman, and he was blathering about how he was ready for them when they came, and that no Indian was going to get the better of him.”

“No Indian?” Dr. Harker repeated.

The blind fiddler nodded. “Those were his very words. No Indian.”

“Thank you,” said Dr. Harker. “That is very interesting. Thank you for your help.” He put some money in the blind man’s hand.

“With all respect, your honor, you can keep your money,” said the fiddler solemnly. “Will was a good lad. You catch the louse that did for him, and that’ll be payment enough.”

“Then will you accept our thanks?” said Dr. Harker, shaking his hand.

“That I will, sir. And here’s hoping you keep safe in your searching.”

As they walked away, Dr. Harker said, “I’m beginning to wonder if old Purney wasn’t right about the Mohocks after all.”