The Return of Moriarty (22 page)

Moriarty and Spear stood before them, Moriarty smiling, the twist of his lips betraying contempt.

“You have not been roughly treated, I trust?”

Fray appeared to have difficulty in swallowing.

“No,” he croaked, surly.

“Good,” Moriarty nodded. “And they have been given food?” he queried of Spear.

“They've both been fed.”

“Then you should have no complaints. I am pleased with what you have told my people. You need not fear. You will live and be kept safe—very safe—from the influence of Mr. Green and Mr. Butler.”

His laugh was unpleasant, leaving the two Green lieutenants with the distinct feeling that death might just possibly be preferable to whatever the Professor had in store for them.

Moriarty returned to his chambers to puzzle on the many things he had in hand: the rout of Green and Butler; the Harrow robbery; what he would say to Sal Hodges when she arrived; the details he still had to finalize regarding the Jacobs boys in the 'Steel; and other matters which spread beyond the Channel to the Continent.

Ember was doing the rounds, mingling with the men and women who worked the many dodges, tricks and petty thievings that brought ample returns to Moriarty and his people.

Sunday was never the best day in London, with the shops closed and some of the eating houses and other places of entertainment bereft of those who ran them. It was, however, a good day for the pickpockets, petty thieves and tricksters—those very people whom Moriarty had sent Ember to see.

The day wore on and the foxy little man traversed large areas of the city, watching those engaged in the many swindles perpetrated daily on the unwary, for Sundays were also a good time to catch those who were in London from the provinces and not wise to the ways of the magsmen, the fast talkers with their cuffs turned back doing the three-card trick, or the thimbleriggers and their three little silver cups with the dried pea, and plenty of folk sure they could tell under which cup the pea rested; or the Charley pitchers, with their weighted dice. All of them had their particular assistants, the nobblers and buttoners, the sweeteners and jolliers.

There were the dippers, who worked the pavements where good folk walked, pausing to examine goods displayed in the windows, and the fawney-droppers, looking the pictures of innocence as they inquired of passersby if the ring or watch or brooch they had just picked from the gutter could possibly be gold, and if so what a pity it was that the pawnshops were not open as they had need of a few shillings. On any Sunday, worthless rings and trinkets constantly changed hands and many a man's pocket was lighter because of his own desire to make profit.

All this time Lee Chow was moving from duly appointed house to house, mainly in the dockland areas. Moriarty had learned—far earlier than the narcotics barons who infest our cities today—that mankind is always looking for ways of escape, and the opium and dope dens of Victorian London, while not so far outside the law as they are today, brought many a rich coin to the pockets of the Professor. Lee Chow saw that the sticky sweet opium was delivered and in good supply and that other drugs, such as the costly alcoholic derivative from opium, laudanum, so favored by those who would not be seen near the opium den, was readily available.

Paget was on much more straightforward errands. The men he visited were those who had served the Professor well for many years. First the fences in their hidden rooms, secret places and storehouses behind pawnshops.

In spite of the fact that old Solly Abrahams had visited Moriarty to pay his respects only a matter of two days before, he was the first whom Paget called on—as though to assure the wily old man that the Professor looked after his own. From thence it was a case of walking long miles, of taking glasses of wine and being shown gems prised from their settings, crucibles of molten gold, rich silver ornaments, watches, seals, furs, items of jade and many assorted silks and satins, hoarded in a couple of dozen houses across London and ready to be altered, refurbished, sold to dealers, taken out of the country, or transported to towns where a certain and promised buyer or cove awaited their delivery.

Paget did not call on either John Togger or Israel Krebitz, the two fences denounced by Fray and Roach, but to the rest he brought a word of assurance from Moriarty—assurance that also contained a word of warning.

He called upon others also. The cash carriers—the ponces to whores who hawked their mutton in the streets and the bullies who carried Moriarty's cut from the houses run by Sal Hodges to the coffers in Limehouse. He visited also the collectors, men known by that name because at one time their work was solely that of collecting from those foolish enough to walk alone, and late, along secluded byways, paths and lanes. They still improved their income by this simple employment—the talents for which included only a gruff voice, menacing manner and a certain bulk—but Moriarty had extended the scope of their work. Now the collectors went day by day and week by week into coffeehouses and restaurants, to tradesmen and cabbies, who, rather than risk the wrath of Moriarty (which undoubtedly would mean at least a loss of trade, and at most severe physical damage) paid a set rate, or portion of their earnings, in return for the safety of their lives, property and business.

Spear also worked his way around the city, and he, like the others, saw men whose business provided Moriarty with the funds that kept the wheels turning within his large and variegated family. There were the moneylenders, whose loans were often repaid in blood and always with sweat and concern. Then came the coiners—the shofulmen—who worked long and dangerous hours with all their paraphernalia of molds, metals, crucibles and galvanic batteries for electroplating: whole families of them were often hidden away, jealously guarded by Moriarty's crows and a few dogs, as they produced counterfeit silver coinage. Lastly there were the forgers, men with great technical skill, producing not only bank notes but also the multitude of other documents that were the lifeblood of the whole complex system of crime—bogus references, “characters,” testimonials, even pedigrees: papers to get
people
into places and to get
things
out.

Like his colleagues, Spear brought messages of goodwill from the Professor, couched in terms that could not be misinterpreted. The loyalty of these people would be rewarded as only Moriarty could reward. Treachery would be detected before it was even attempted and there was but one reward for treachery.

Spear saw the last person on his mental list at around four in the afternoon. Normally he would have returned to give Moriarty his report, but today both heart and mind were directed to settling the score with Halling. In a grim mood he took a hansom and was set down, at half-past the hour, outside The Victory, the pub where he first met the butler who had so callusly allowed his friend's woman to be thrown into the street. He would not see Halling damned today, but at least the ball would begin to roll; eventually it would take the man skittling down to hell.

Sal Hodges, dressed like a duchess, arrived in the Professor's chambers at noon.

“My, Sal.” The Professor rubbed his hands. “I could do a jig with you today, you look tasty as an eel pie.”

Sal threw her head back in a short laugh.

“What's the matter, Professor, didn't little Mary McNiel give you enough greens? I had a noble lord in last week and he said that one night with Mary'd last any normal man a lifetime.”

“What do I know of normal men, Sal? A glass?”

She nodded, sinking with some elegance into a chair and accepting the proffered glass of claret.

“I hear you've seen to friend Tappit.”

“News travels.”

“There's much talk.”

Sal sensed, in the pause, that something was irritating the Professor.

“There'll be more within a few hours,” he said, his tone giving the impression of a man spreading a winning hand at the card table.

“Is that why you want me?”

“Some of it. A matter has come to my ears, Sal. A serious matter which causes some alarm.”

“You look stern, James.”

Sal was one of the few people who could call Moriarty James in private.

“There is cause.” He looked up at her from the desk, taking a piece of paper in the fingers of his right hand, then dropping it again. “What, my dear Sal, has become of Charlotte Ford, Liz Williams, Prudence Catchpole, Hester Dainton and Polly Mount?” He ticked the names off, right fingers on left.

Sal's glass hesitated, poised an inch or so from her lips.

“Ah,” she said quietly. “I wondered when …”

“When I would come to that?”

“Yes.” Her sharp sigh was one of annoyance with herself. “I should have talked to you of it on Friday morning. It has not been far from my mind this last six months.”

“Did they leave with your knowledge?”

“I knew they had left, of course. But it was unexpected, and I had no hand in it. To be true, they simply disappeared. On a Sunday morning. Last September.”

“It was not reported?”

“Of course it was reported.” She was angry at the question. “Like so many other matters, it was reported to Moran; and when he did nothing, I had some of the cash carriers make inquiries.”

“The five of them simply left?”

She nodded. “Exactly.”

“Do you know where they are now?”

“I have not seen them. There was one report that they were in a house near Regent Street, near the Quadrant. None of the other girls has seen them and there has been no explanation.”

Moriarty made a sharp sucking sound. “Sal, we have much trouble. My absence has been the cause of great laxity. Moran, whom I foolishly trusted, concerned himself with his own pastimes and not with the complexities of the family business. But you are aware of that. Now we are faced with a struggle against usurpers. Your five ladybirds have played the crooked cross, as have others, and they will all, like the children they are, go through St. Peter's needle.”

Sal bit her lower lip. “I was never totally in accord with Liz or Prudence, but they were all good workers.”

“And they all knew much, Sal. Too much, which has doubtless been blown about among their new masters. Now listen carefully. You'll keep your girls close for the next few days. You have enough strength in your houses?”

“I don't think we need fear.”

Moriarty was silent for the space of a minute.

“I think it would be best if you send the McNiel girl here for the time being. We need another woman about.…”

“And I lose silver.”

“A small price to pay, Sal. If you were not so dear to me, I might have felt the need to.…”

“To put your punishers in, Professor? I think not.”

“It is a lesson of life, Sal.” Moriarty's voice was sharp as a razor. “Change is an easy thing to effect. Not one of us is necessary to the whole—except, perhaps, me.” His head swung from side to side as though in great agitation. “It would be a sorry matter if we had to part company now, Sal. I might even weep for you.”

Sal sipped her claret, and one could scarcely note the mild tremor of her hand.

“As you say.” She acquiesced, but her eyes searched the pattern of the carpet, as though seeking some way of escape.

“Then Mary comes here tonight. There will be other company for her.”

“Kate Wright?”

“And more. You did not know that Paget is to wed?”

“Pip Paget? I thought he was wed enough—to you.”

“There is a young woman, here in the house. They are to be hammered for life as soon as it is convenient.”

Sal Hodges smiled, though not with her eyes.

“You wish Mary to teach her the tricks?”

Moriarty chuckled unpleasantly.

Half an hour after Sal Hodges left the warehouse, a young man of neat appearance, dressed in sober gray, arrived at the doors. He was no stranger to the Professor's headquarters, being clerk to the solicitor, William Sandhill—of Sandhill and Cox, Grey's Inn—who looked after Moriarty's affairs: an arrangement which in no way seemed to bother the consciences of either Mr. Sandhill or Mr. Cox, for Moriarty had bought the practice for them and was in fact their only client.

Once Sal had left, Moriarty returned to plotting, step by step, the action that would be required to smash Green's and Butler's attempted takeover. By the time he had finished with them, Moriarty mused, neither Green nor Butler would be in a fit state to work even the kinchen-lay.

The landlord of The Victory recognized Spear as the detective who had drifted in on the previous lunchtime and had a lengthy discussion with Mr. Halling. He greeted him with due deference, being a man who preferred to keep on the right side of the law. Spear accepted a glass of grog, on the house, and asked if his friend Mr. Halling had been abroad that day.

“Not yet, sir.” The landlord looked up at the clock. “Another hour or so before Mr. Halling comes in of a Sunday evening. Always drops in for a glass before he has his night out. Goes for a walk around the town on a Sunday, our Mr. Halling.”

There was no wink or leer, but Spear caught the meaning.

“Can you give him a message, in private, from me?”

He dropped his voice, assuming an attitude meant to convey great trust, as though the landlord were the one person in the world to be the carrier of a confidence.

The landlord nodded gravely.

“Mr. Halling is most anxious to trace a person whom he wishes to help. Can you tell him that if he is still of the same mind, he will find the young woman we discussed at number 43 Berwick Street. She will be there tonight and is in great need of help.”

The address was that of one of Sal Hodges' houses—not the best, but one in which Spear had many friends, particularly the pair of cash carriers who acted as bullies for the protection of the girls. With no apparent haste, he finished his drink and went out into the late afternoon. A quiet walk down to Berwick Street, a few words with the people there, and he would have halling on toast.