The Hellfire Conspiracy (14 page)

The man turned and, without a look back, climbed into his vehicle and rattled off. The gang followed, looking for the nearest public house. In two minutes, we had the courtyard all to ourselves.

“I believe that gang is the Ratcliff Highway Boys, but I’ve got to find out who that gentleman is,” Barker stated.

“Oh, I know who he is, sir,” I told him. “That is Lord Hesketh, Palmister Clay’s father. I’m surprised he didn’t recognize me. It was his money that put me in prison.”

“A
NY CHANCE FOR SOME COFFEE?” I ASKED MAC
after we came back.

“You drink too much of that brew,” he answered.

“Would you rather I fell asleep at my post?”

He made the coffee, though not without a few sighs. Then he and Barker lay down back to back. Hearing Barker’s spectacles being set on the floor, I took two steps toward him and then heard Mac cough. There was no chance of finally seeing the Guv without his spectacles, not with his watchdog guarding him.

I drank the coffee and watched Green Street from the window. Mac had set up a notebook and logged various people as they came and went, presumably from Barker’s descriptions of them. The Guv had continued to record people through the evening. For once, I had the easier work; there wasn’t much to write down. The night watchman made his early rounds and the constable walked his beat, swinging his truncheon more out of boredom than swagger. The night soil cart came through and the waste of hundreds of horses were shoveled into it, as if it were a precious thing. A few inebriates were escorted home, and the homeless, forbidden to loiter or sleep in doorways, were herded along by the police like tired sheep. I grew bored with looking through the grimy window and made my way up the ladder to the roof. It was balmy outside that evening, and I could smell the river on the wind. Pigeons cooed in the corners of the roof, not discomfited in the least by my presence. I sat on the ledge, watched the street, and thought.

What I thought of was Jenny Ashby, or rather, Jenny Llewelyn, though she had that name but a short time in this life. It was as if out of some sort of self-preservation I had shut her up in a wardrobe somewhere and seeing Palmister Clay had opened it again. My Jenny, my own sweet girl. I recalled the way the wind caught the curls by her ears and the sun lit them up and turned them red. I remembered the pattern of freckles across her upturned nose as if she were standing in front of me and the warm, soft blue of her eyes, like cornflowers, like the entire June sky reflected therein. I’d been tricked into marrying her, perhaps, but if she were there just now, I’d have married her all over again. Beatrice Potter was a beauty and a great catch for any man in the whole of England, but I would have traded the entire world for just one more afternoon with Jenny.

I’d never have that afternoon, however. Palmister Clay had robbed me of those final months. It washed over me again, like a bucket of scalding water, the deep anger that I felt for that man.

She was gone from me, buried in an unmarked grave somewhere in Oxford, a pauper’s grave. At least, that’s what a solicitor had told me. Where did she lie, my wife, my dearly departed? How did one look for an unmarked grave? I had not the least idea how to begin.

All this being alone was making me maudlin. I removed my jacket and did a few stretches on the roof the way Barker had taught me. At least it kept me awake. The hours slowly passed. By the light of the gas lamps, I saw the night watchman and the constables continue their rounds. How did they stand the boredom? I knew I should go mad in such a situation.

Eventually, there was a change in the step of the constables below. They began knocking on doors, waking the residents for their daily work. There was money to be made in this, Barker had told me once, as much as four pence a week per residence. No need for a timepiece when someone else can watch the time for you. The constables and the night watchmen were in competition. I watched them hurry through the streets, knocking steadily on doors, then, before I knew it, Mac was at my elbow, with a fresh cup of coffee. It was six in the morning and I had finished my shift.

Jacob Maccabee and I have an unusual relationship. We’d gotten off on the wrong foot on my arrival in Barker’s household. Sometimes we treated each other fairly, and other times we traded barbs. Perhaps I was thankful for the coffee or tired or simply overwrought, but just then I felt I needed one less enemy in the world.

“Mac,” I said, “I wanted to tell you you’ve done a good job of looking after us here. You were also rather handy with that gun of yours, even if you didn’t actually use it.”

“Thank you, sir.”

It was a blatant attempt to flatter him. He knew it and I knew it, but it unbent him a little nevertheless.

“Tell me, how came you to be hired by the Guv?”

Mac gave me a guarded look. “I assumed he had told you.”

“The Guv? Not a word. Why would you think that?”

“You work with the man.”

“You know how he is. One would sooner get blood from a stone. So, come, tell me how he came to hire you.”

Mac put a foot up on the ledge and looked out across the rooftops. I thought he might refuse to tell me, but all of a sudden, he began to speak.

“I was working as a second footman to a good family in Islington. The master was a director for the Great Western Railway. When they hired me they called me Mac in order to conceal my religion. I was eighteen years old.”

“Why did you want to be a servant? It isn’t a normal occupation for a Jew.”

“Yes, I know. I was forbidden to let my beard grow and couldn’t wear my yarmulke. I can’t explain it well. I like order, and I like being a part of something larger than myself. Being a servant is not a bad living, and one always has room and board. Some butlers retire with more than a clergyman or a colonel. If one likes the work, it is not a bad occupation.”

“Forgive the interruption.”

“Not at all. As I said, I was a second footman. Quite often, I was sent on errands, to get spices for the cook, perhaps, or to carry a message for the lady of the house. One day, I chanced to speak with a young lady about my own age who lived in the neighborhood. Her name was Alice Padgett. She was the daughter of an admiral who had died at sea, and lived with her uncle under reduced circumstances. She spoke to me occasionally after that, and some of the staff would chaff me about having a lady friend in the neighborhood.”

“I was waiting for a woman to come into it,” I said.

“Are you going to comment on everything I say?” he said severely. “She never became my lady friend because she was murdered.”

“Murdered?” I had expected romance.

“Yes. One terrible morning, the police came to the house and spoke to the master. I was summoned, and the next thing I knew I was being locked in darbies and elbowed into a Black Maria. They told me Alice was dead and I was Scotland Yard’s main suspect.”

“Because you are a Jew, I suppose. That is monumentally unfair.”

“They took me to Scotland Yard and put me in a room and berated me for hours. They accused me of slitting Alice’s throat, a lover’s quarrel, they said; but of course, we weren’t. Lovers, I mean. I liked her very much, but we had only spoken in the street. Anyway, they kept saying it would be better if I confessed. Obviously, they didn’t care about finding her real killer. They just wanted a confession, and they weren’t scrupulous about how to get it. They beat me badly and said I had resisted arrest. I broke down and cried. I was very frightened. When I still didn’t confess, they locked me in a cell and brought me pork sausages.
Pork sausages,
for every meal. It was that or nothing.”

“Monstrous.”

“The next morning they brought in a newspaper. The newspaper had all but convicted me, and with good reason, too. The knife, the murder weapon, covered in Alice’s blood, had been found in my room, wrapped in one of my shirts. The inspector in charge interrogated me again brutally. He said he would beat a confession out of me, if he could not get it any other way. When I didn’t speak, he sent me back to my cell to think over my confession. He demanded it by morning. I seriously considered giving him one, just to stop the beatings.

“Later that day, I was taken out again but not to the interrogation room. I went to another room, where a man stood waiting to see me. He said his name was Cyrus Barker, and he was a private enquiry agent who had been retained by the Board of Deputies to look into the matter of my arrest.”

“So, the first case the Guv had with the Jewish Board of Deputies was actually your case.”

“Yes.”

“What did he look like—the Guv, I mean?”

“Much the same. A bit rough around the edges, to be truthful. He had a beard and wore those spectacles, of course. He was at least a stone lighter. He looked alien, like a recent arrival, which in fact, he was. Perhaps that is why the Board of Deputies hired him in the first place.”

“I’m sorry. I’ve interrupted again.”

“Yes, you have,” Mac said, looking vaguely annoyed. “After that, Scotland Yard tried even harder to get me to confess, but I noticed they were less likely to slap me about. A solicitor named Abram Salomon came to speak with me and said if they really had anything to charge me with they’d have done so already. They had the murder weapon, but the evening Alice was murdered, my time was accounted for. I shared a room with the first footman, you see. While Scotland Yard swarmed over the house looking for trapdoors and sliding panels, I hoped the odd-looking private enquiry agent was out in the streets looking for the real killer of my friend.

“Close to a week went by after that. It’s hard to tell in prison. The inspector had gone through all his questions and was merely repeating them, hoping I’d break down. Then one morning, I was released and practically tossed into the street. Barker was there, waiting for me, with my parents, Mr. Salomon, and a reporter from the
Jewish Chronicle.
The Guv had found Alice’s murderer, a lodger in the next street, who had developed an interest in her that bordered upon mania. He hated me, having seen her speaking with a Jew, and had contrived to gain entry into the house by flattering the charwoman. She also provided an alibi for him; but under questioning, Barker had broken it, and she confessed.

“I was free but completely unemployable. None of the newspapers who had blackened my name had the slightest interest in printing a retraction, though they covered the subsequent trial. Nobody wanted a footman who had been involved in a murder, and so my career was over. Then one day the Guv appeared at my parents’ house in Newgate and said he’d purchased a home in Newington and required a manservant. Was I interested? I took charge and at his request ordered all the furnishings for the house. I also suggested he might find more custom if he shaved his beard and that he try a tailor of mine in Holborn.”

“Krause brothers?” I asked, remembering the shop Barker had sent me to my first day.

“Indeed. Mr. Dummolard was in France, attending a cooking school, and Mr. Ho had not yet purchased his establishment, so we had most of our meals in from the Elephant and Castle.”

“What about his ward, Bok Fu Ying?”

“Apparently when he and Dummolard and Ho arrived in the Isle of Dogs, Barker bought the first vacant building he found in Three Colt Street and installed them both there. When he moved to Newington, she came with him but found the area not to her liking and returned to Limehouse.”

“When did he acquire the office in Whitehall?”

“Shortly after he bought the house. I don’t know where he got the money for it or Dummolard for his training or Ho for the tearoom he would shortly purchase. I assumed, like many gentlemen, they had acquired their fortunes in the East.”

“I suppose Quong and Jenkins came along next,” I said.

Barker suddenly stepped onto the roof, and Mac snapped to attention. I realized that was all of the secrets I was to learn that day.

“L
IFT YOUR GUARD, TOMMY.”

Barker had sent me on to McClain’s as soon as breakfast was over. The time grew short until the match.

“What, so you can batter my liver again?” I asked the reverend, bobbing and weaving.

“Liver, kidneys—makes no difference, boyo.”

I ducked and lashed out but caught Handy Andy only on one of his stony shoulders.

“Don’t you have anyone my size?” I asked.

“All the kiddies are still abed.”

“You should be in the music hall. Boxing and comedy in one act.”

“And anyway,” he went on as if he hadn’t heard, “your opponent isn’t your size, as I understand it.”

“Is there any chance—Ow!”

McClain had got one over my flimsy guard and caught me across the brow. “Quit jawing while I’m smiting you.”

I hopped ’round the ring, sweating like a horse after a mile run. This was no way to win a match against anybody. Twenty-two, and I was to be cut down in the prime of life. I tried to get by; and suddenly I was against the ropes, Andrew McClain hammering me in the stomach and ribs, with an occasional smack to the jaw and nose. I couldn’t take much more of this. In fact, I didn’t. My opponent hooked me with a right to the ear, and the next I knew I was down on one knee, shaking my head. McClain lifted me by the shoulders and dropped me down on the wooden stool in the corner.

“It’s a good thing your boss isn’t here. He’s not overjoyed about this challenge you’ve gotten yourself into and wouldn’t have gone as easy on you as I have.”

“You call this easy?”

“Aye. Break’s over,” he said, kicking the stool out from under me. “Time for another round.”

“This isn’t doing me any good!”

“This will be just a walk in the park compared to what your opponent will give you. I’ve been asking about a little. Nice jab.”

I’d managed to tap him on the jaw. It was the first clean hit I’d made since the sparring had started.

“And?”

“General opinion is that Clay is good. Drinks too much and has an eye for female flesh, but so far it hasn’t affected his skills. Strictly amateur, of course. I don’t want to scare you, but you’ll have to do better than this.”

“Teach me how to fight, then. I already know how to get hit.”

“Just reminding you. Barker’s been teaching you that Chinese wrestling, and it’s good, don’t get me wrong; but if you are gonna wear these pillows on your mitts, you’d better learn you some good, old-fashioned John Bull boxing.”

He caught me square on the nose then, and that was the end of the match. I began to bleed like a faucet. The reverend moved me to the stool and held my head back so the blood could flow down my throat, although how that was an improvement, I couldn’t see.

“Let me get out of these mitts and I’ll mop your face proper, Tommy boy. You know, your right’s not bad, but your left is all over the place. You need to learn control, control and follow through.”

McClain performed surgery upon me. That is, he ripped the corner from a towel and screwed it into my nostril. Then he sent me in to bathe in a cold tub and get changed. Once outside, I got rid of it. The bleeding had stopped.

When I got back, Barker was pacing and smoking his pipe. Ribbons of smoke hung in the still air.

“Ah,” he said, catching sight of me. “Come, we must leave immediately.”

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“One of Soho Vic’s lads has located Major DeVere. He’s in Camden Town. We’ve got precious time to collect him and sober him up. The funeral is tomorrow.”

Barker hailed another cab and ordered the driver north to Camden. I noted the expense in the back of my notebook. Costs were adding up.

“What happened to your nose?” the Guv asked.

“I got too close to one of the reverend’s jabs.”

“He’s got a good one, doesn’t he? Someday when you’re in your dotage, you’ll be able to say Handy Andy McClain once bloodied your nose, but I doubt anyone will believe you. The man’s a legend.”

Camden Town was a pleasant surprise. It had a Dickensian feel about it, with old, swaybacked buildings, narrow streets, and a genteel poverty, like a maiden aunt living on a pension. There was one building with the name Fagin on it and another that said Marley.

Barker hired an open carriage at the station and told the driver where to go. He seemed to know this area, as well.
Just how far did his knowledge of the streets go?
I wondered. Had he memorized Tunbridge Wells or Brighton, too?

We pulled up in front of a pub with an open front door spilling light like lager onto the paving stones. It was unremarkable, as public houses go. It might have been a template for every other pub in London.

The publican was a fat, prosperous-looking man, like most I’ve met. He had a face like a bulldog’s, with jowls and rolls of excess flesh, and a stub of a cigar was permanently affixed to the corner of his mouth.

“Is Major DeVere here?” Barker asked.

“Oh, thank God,” the owner exclaimed. “He’s been doing his best to drink up my cellar these past two days. I’ve never seen anyone put down so much wine in my life. Thought he’d quit sometime, but every time we thought he’d passed out, here he come down the stair again, askin’ for ’nother bottle. Crikey, that man can throw down the liquor.”

“His daughter was found murdered, and his wife killed herself,” Barker answered, hoping perhaps to shock him into silence, but it didn’t work.

“Thought it hadda be something like that,” the man said, wiping a glass with a grimy towel. “It was like he was trying to drown hisself, one bottle at a time.”

“Where is he?”

He pointed over our heads with his thumb. “Ain’t got but the one room.”

Barker led me up the stairs, and when he came to the door, opened it without knocking. In the shambles of the inn room, Trevor DeVere sat in a chair with his feet extended and his arms hanging limp. His eyes were glazed, his mustache disordered, and the front of his open shirt stained with wine. He caught sight of us and raised a half-full goblet in the air.

“To your health, gentlemen,” he said, draining it in a gulp.

“We have come to retrieve you, sir,” Barker said stonily. I don’t believe he was as sympathetic to Mr. DeVere’s condition as I.

“I’m where I wish to be,” came the reply. “Push off, gentlemen.”

“No, sir. I’m afraid you’re coming with us. We need to make you presentable for your family’s funeral.”

DeVere came up out of his chair and started to back away, pointing at Barker with one trembling finger while the others wrapped around the neck of a bottle.

“Oh, blazes! Now you’ve gone and done it! I was trying to forget all about that, and you’ve reminded me. A fat lot of good you gents have been to me since I walked into your chambers four days ago. I’ve got a cat left, you know, a nice, fat tom. You can kill him too, if you wish.”

“You may complain at the time of the reckoning, when I present your bill. Until then, I am in charge and I’m saying you must come with me.”

DeVere splashed more wine into his goblet and drank it. Then he was back to the finger pointing. This time, he pointed at me.

“You,” he said, looking at me with bleary red eyes. “You look like an educated chappy. How many circles of Hell are there?”

I glanced at my employer nervously. “I believe there were nine, according to Dante.”

The major shook his head with his eyes closed and a smile on his face. A laugh escaped his lips. “Eleven, there are eleven.”

“What do you mean?”

“There’s the one I’m in now. You didn’t read about that one in old Dante, did you? And then, there’s the really, really deep one where they put all the blasted, thieving, useless private enquiry agents!”

He tried to fill his glass again, but the bottle was finally empty. He looked at it woefully. “I keep pouring this stuff down my throat, hoping for release. The damned publican must be watering it down. I’m sorry. I just want oblivion.”

“If it’s oblivion you want—” Barker said suddenly, his fist coming up under the major’s chin, jarring him with the blow. DeVere dropped into his arms like a sack of potatoes. My employer hoisted the major onto his right shoulder and turned to me. “Go downstairs and settle the bill.”

I don’t believe we had been in the building more than five minutes, and now Barker was leaving with DeVere on his shoulders. I had expected a protracted argument, but Barker had a more expedient method of getting a drunken, angry man out of a public house.

“Where to now, sir?” the cabman asked, once I’d paid DeVere’s bill and we were all ensconced in the carriage.

“Fulham,” Barker growled.

“That’s clear ’cross town, sir!”

“Then you had better not dawdle. I’ll make it worth your time.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I suppose this has turned out as well as could be expected,” the Guv said. “There was a chance he would go back to his barracks and blow his brains out.”

The major came to halfway through the journey.

“Where the hell am I?” he asked.

“You are going home to sleep,” Barker told him. “Tomorrow morning, you’re going to bury your wife and daughter.”

DeVere sat and stared as the carriage rolled down the street. I wasn’t certain whether he’d taken the words in until he spoke again a minute or two later.

“I’m gonna be flogged for this or court-martialed. Or both.”

Neither Barker nor I vouchsafed a remark, but DeVere was suddenly garrulous. “You—you’re gonna catch this blackguard and make him pay, aren’t you?”

“I have every intention of doing so.”

“Gwendolyn…my little Gwendolyn. Used to rock her on my knee, you know.”

“You owe it to her memory to be at her graveside, sober.”

“Have you ever lost a child, Mr. Barker?”

“No.”

“Have you ever lost a wife?”

Barker didn’t respond. My jaw dropped. DeVere, drunk as he was, didn’t notice and continued. “Then don’t dictate terms to me. I’m paying for the bloody funeral and I’m going to be there. Now leave off.”

We arrived at the DeVere residence. The butler, a capable man who looked like he might have seen military before domestic service, met us and helped his master from the vehicle, issuing orders to the maids for a pot of coffee and a hot bath. We left the arrangements for DeVere’s appearance in the man’s capable hands. On the way back to Bethnal Green, Barker was back to his normal self, watching traffic and turning over aspects of the case, but I pondered the unanswered question in my heart.