But then the pair, the man and the girl, passed under a gas street lamp, and with a sudden shocking jolt that almost seemed to knock the breath out of her, Nellie recognized the man.
“Kate,” she gasped, pointing. “There! It’s Jack London!”
Kate looked. “And that’s Charlotte Conway with him, Nellie! I’m sure of it!”
As Kate spoke, Adam gave another loud cry and bolted down the stone steps. After that, it was all a wild confusion of shouting and pushing and scrambling as he attempted to shove his way through the crowd in pursuit of Lottie and Jack. Nellie would have gone after him, but Kate seized her arm.
“Let them go, Nellie,” she said firmly. “Leave it to Adam to catch her.”
“But what of him?” Nellie cried, desperately trying to pull away. “What of Jack London? I have to catch her, Kate. I have to warn her! I can’t let him do to her what he did to me!”
“There’s nothing you can do, Nellie,” Kate said in a low voice, putting a sisterly arm around her shoulders and pulling her apart from the press of people. “Perhaps it isn’t what you’re thinking, and there’s nothing of that sort between them. Or perhaps, if Lottie has been with Jack for a time, the damage is already done. Either way, she won’t welcome your interference. And you certainly don’t want to confront
him,
do you?” She tipped up Nellie’s chin, wiping the tears from her cheeks.
Nellie bit her lip, thinking distractedly. Kate was right about one thing—she couldn’t push her way through the milling crowd to catch up with Jack and Lottie. And she suddenly realized that she didn’t want to. Did she want to confront him? Perhaps, once she was sure she was carrying his child. But not yet, and certainly not now, in this public place, where she would be bitterly conscious of hundreds of eyes, watching, hundreds of ears, listening. She
had
to talk to Lottie, though—she could not allow her friend to be deceived and betrayed by that man, as she had been. But how would she find her to warn her? If not here and now, where and when?
There was nothing to be done for the moment. But Nellie suddenly realized, as she allowed her friend to lead her down the steps and into the darkening street, that she knew exactly how and where to find Jack London.
And with an anguished certainty, she knew where she would find Lottie, as well.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Flight is lawful, when one flies from tyrants.
Racine,
Phaedra,
1677
Dmitri Tropov, alias Vladimir Rasnokov (among a great many other aliases), had not attended the Anarchists’ trial, although he lingered near enough to Old Bailey to gain a clear idea of what was going on. He had felt that his presence in the courtroom might present an unpleasant complication, and from what he could gather from the bailiffs and barristers who wandered in and out of the Bell & Bailey, the pub nearest the court, his instinct had been entirely correct. If Charles Sheridan had noticed and recognized Vladimir Rasnokov among the spectators in the courtroom, the defense counsel might have attempted to summon him to the witness box, in spite of the Crown’s pleading of public-interest privilege.
Tropov had no intention of revealing to an English court, however, the exact nature of his association with Ivan Kopinski. Besides, such proceedings were, in his experience, an utter waste of time. In Russia, when the police did their work properly, trials were unnecessary—unless, of course, the State wished to make some point or other, such as reminding the people who was in charge, or making an example of someone. To Tropov, the English notions of the jury of peers, presumption of innocence, and adversarial procedure seemed alien and unfamiliar—and foolishly utopian, especially when it came to dealing with crimes committed by the underclass. He had no doubt, however, that in the case of the Anarchists, the Crown would not hesitate to set aside such judicial abstractions as “justice” and “fairness” in favor of its own interests. And even though it appeared from all accounts that the defense was mounting a sharp assault on the prosecution’s case, he was sure that the judge would find a way to resolve the matter as it should be resolved.
Tropov was astounded, therefore, when he heard the jury’s verdict, which had spread through the Bell & Bailey like wildfire on the steppes. Only two of the Anarchists had been found guilty, while the third was declared innocent! Scarcely able to credit what he was hearing, Tropov left his mug of ale on the table, dashed across the street, and joined the milling crowd on the sidewalk, anxious to learn what had happened.
After a few breathless inquiries, however, he discovered that his fears were groundless. It was the Englishman Gould whom the jury had found innocent, a trade-union fellow and dangerous agitator, no doubt, but of no interest to Tropov. The penalty of ten years imposed on the other two, however—and particularly upon Ivan Kopinski—presented a new set of problems. Tropov had expected a shorter sentence, five years, perhaps, or seven at the most. It might be exceedingly difficult to lay hands upon a man when he finally emerged from a decade in an English prison. In the shifting landscape of European and Central Asian intrigue, ten years was an eternity. In ten years, Russia might well be at war with England.
Moving against the crowd, Tropov made his way around to the yard between Newgate and the Old Bailey, where the Black Maria was waiting to return the condemned men to prison. He had no plan in mind, for he had to admit to being at a momentary loss as to what, exactly, to do next, with regard to Kopinski. He went simply to satisfy himself that the transport of the men was going as expected. It was not.
Tropov stood just inside the gate, along with perhaps thirty or forty people—some of them tipsy, others merely rowdy—which had gathered around the Black Maria. Night was falling and the gas lamps in the yard cast a misty glow across the cobbled pavement. As the door opened and the uniformed guards led the shuffling pair of shackled and handcuffed prisoners out to the waiting van, a slender young woman in a red
babushka
and embroidered apron flung herself wildly out of the crowd and ran the dozen yards toward them, screaming at Kopinski in an incoherent torrent of Russian.
Amused, Tropov smiled to himself. He couldn’t quite catch the woman’s words, but from her behavior and her gestures, it appeared that she had once been Kopinski’s sweetheart—and was with child, it would seem, from the way she screamed and wept and pointed to her belly. Apparently, Kopinski had not practiced all the Anarchist tenets, especially that which discouraged relationships with women. The poor creature flew passionately at the handcuffed man, pummeling him with her fists and crying a few Russian words over and over again. This time, Tropov managed to catch them, or thought he had.
“Klyuchee!”
she screamed.
“Skreetm v’karmenye!”
Kopinski appeared to be completely dumbfounded at this unexpected and highly emotional outburst, but he finally spoke a few surprised words in Russian. Hearing him, the girl threw up her arms, let out a long and heart-rending shriek of despair, and collapsed to the pavement in a huddled faint.
There was sudden pandemonium. The shouting crowd surged forward through the gathering darkness, completely surrounding the prisoners and the van. The horses whinnied and reared in their traces as the driver fought to hold them. The guards, the prisoners, and the people became a shouting, swirling, disorganized mass. It took a minute, perhaps longer, for the warders to regain control of the situation, push the crowd back, and hustle their prisoners into the van. It took a moment more for a dark-haired man in a green cap to push the crowd aside, revive the girl, and lift her to her feet. The bystanders parted, murmuring sympathetically, as he half-supported, half-carried the sobbing young woman out of the yard and into the street, where they disappeared from Tropov’s sight.
“The prisoner’s sweetheart, most like,” said the old woman standing next to Tropov. She shook her head sadly. “Ten years is a long time. I pity ’er, raisin’ the child ’erself.”
“That’s wot comes o’ takin’ up with th’ crim’nal class,” snapped her companion, a younger woman wrapped in a dark shawl. “She should’ve known better. Come along, Mum. It’ll be rainin’ afore we gets ’ome.”
A guard stepped out from behind the van and raised and lowered his arm. The driver lifted his whip, the horses pulled, and the black, windowless van moved heavily out of the courtyard. Curiously, Tropov sauntered after it, watching as it turned into the dark street. On the other side of the pavement, just past the Bell & Bailey, a hansom cab pulled away from the curb, following the van at a little distance. A moment later, and the darkness had swallowed both.
Tropov took a cigarette out of his pocket, lit it, and considered this small but extremely entertaining bit of theater, for theater it was. Only two of the many persons in the crowded yard, it seemed—he, Tropov, and the prisoner, Kopinski—had understood what it was that the hysterical girl had actually said. Her Russian had been so abominably garbled as to be almost indecipherable, but Tropov had managed to make it out.
“The Frenchman has your keys,” she had said. “Free yourselves. Get into the cab that follows the van.”
Tropov’s first impulse had been to cry a warning to the guards in order to prevent the escape of the two Anarchists, but he had quickly suppressed that urge. Now, he considered the situation, smiling, for it seemed that circumstances had turned, inexplicably but quite fortuitously, in his favor. Kopinski would shortly use the keys he had been so inventively provided to slip out of the embrace of the English judiciary and into the dark and gloomy night—an escape he would no doubt welcome. But under the circumstances, a fugitive Kopinski was far more available than an imprisoned Kopinski. Tropov’s operatives were most efficient. They would very soon have the fellow.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
ANARCHISTS ESCAPE PRISON VAN! DANGEROUS PAIR AT LARGE IN LONDON POLICE BAFFLED
The Times,
5 September 1902
Charles put down
The Times
and stood as Kate came into the breakfast room at Sibley House. She was already dressed to go out, in a plain blue tweed walking suit. Her auburn hair was pulled back so severely that she looked rather like a Salvation Army worker. “Good morning, my dear,” he said, leaning forward to kiss her. “I hope I didn’t wake you last night when I came home. It was very late.”
“If you woke me, I must have gone straight back to sleep,” Kate replied with a little laugh. “Yesterday was a very long day. I was exhausted.” To Richards, she said, “Coffee, please.” As the butler poured her coffee, she went to the sideboard to help herself to eggs, bacon, and a slice of toast. Over her shoulder, she added, “Savidge was wonderful yesterday, Charles. He showed up Inspector Ashcraft for exactly what he is, a conniving trickster.” She turned. “You handled the fingerprints brilliantly.”
“Apparently the jury weren’t entirely impressed,” Charles said dryly. “Two of the three men were found guilty.”
Kate brought her plate back to the table and sat down, shaking her head. “It’s such a pity, Charles. I’m glad that Adam Gould was spared, of course, but it’s sad that the other two must suffer such a terrible injustice, and chiefly because they’re foreigners. That seems to be the only reason they weren’t acquitted. Isn’t there anything that can be done? An appeal, perhaps?”
“Actually, something has been done,” Charles said, with a chuckle. “A bit of escape artistry, worthy of the great Houdini.” He held up the newspaper.
Kate scanned the headline and gasped incredulously. “They got away?” She threw back her head and laughed with delight. “Now, that’s justice for you!”
“Poetic justice, if you ask me,” Charles said, folding the paper and putting it beside his empty plate. He picked up his coffee cup. “The law wouldn’t let them go, so they took the law into their own hands.”
Kate attacked her eggs. “How did it happen?”
“According to
The Times
, the van was on its way back to Holloway Prison, when both men suddenly shed their handcuffs, overpowered the guard who had been locked in with them, and knocked him senseless. When the van reached the prison, the rear doors were unlatched, the guard was unconscious, and the prisoners were gone. The guard was not seriously injured, but he wasn’t able, apparently, to provide any useful information about the escape.
The Times
says that the police are seeking a Russian girl.”
Kate looked up, her eyes widening suddenly. “A Russian girl?”
Charles nodded. “It seems that she was involved in an odd commotion that occured in the yard outside the Old Bailey, when the men were being put into the van. The police are speculating that she managed somehow to get her hands on the keys and pass them to one of the prisoners. They’re questioning the guards.”
Kate leaned forward, her eyes intent. “Charles, that Russian girl—she was Charlotte Conway!”
Charles stared at her. He could feel his jaw dropping. “You saw what happened?”
“Not exactly.” Kate sat back, picked up her toast, and began to spoon marmalade on it. “Nellie Lovelace and I were standing on the steps outside the courtroom after the verdict was announced, trying to hail a cab. Adam came out and stood on the steps, not far away. We saw him at the same moment that he saw a Russian girl in the crowd and began to call Lottie’s name. Then he rushed down the steps after her. She was headed in the direction of the Old Bailey yard.”
Charles’s lips tightened. “You’re saying that Adam Gould was involved in the escape?” If true, that was unfortunate. He could be charged with rendering aid to escaping convicts, and this time, Savidge probably wouldn’t be able to get him off.
“Not Adam,” Kate said, shaking her head. “He couldn’t catch up to the girl. The sidewalk was very crowded, and she had a head start.” She looked at him over the rim of her coffee cup, her eyes twinkling mischievously. “But someone else may have been involved in the escape—someone we both know.”