The Return of Moriarty Read online

  Quite suddenly Pip Paget felt fatigued in mind and body. The scent of the night’s business was still in his nostrils and the bruises on his aching limbs. He very much wanted to hold Fanny close and hear her whisper in his ear, and, as he felt the desire, so he experienced the same confusing sense of dissatisfaction that came when thinking of Fanny—the small sunlit picture of the pair of them, and the rose-trellised cottage with the children around the woman’s skirts, and clean air in his lungs.

  He pushed the thoughts away, knowing how much of his life he owed to Professor Moriarty, and how impossible it would be to live any other kind of life than the one already etched out for him by his master in crime. Paget would not have understood if someone had told him that he was a romantic at heart.

  The Limehouse headquarters ran with activity: men having their wounds tended by the women, others sorting through the goods pillaged from Togger and Krebitz, taking drink and even washing the night’s sweat from their bodies—not a favored pastime among their fraternity, but one encouraged by the Professor.

  In his chambers Moriarty heard the news and was elated by the way in which his men had demolished his rivals, though he was profoundly disturbed and irritated to hear that both Green and Butler had so narrowly missed being taken.

  “You think they had prior intelligence of our plans?” he asked Paget, who sat in front of the desk with the dust and blood of the night still on him.

  “They were certain sure that you had returned. You know that by the ache in your own shoulder.” Moriarty still wore a sling on his damaged arm. “But,” Paget continued, “I do not think they knew any full details. Unless …” His voice trailed away as though carried on the wind.

  “Unless?” The Professor fixed him with the deep eyes, head turning slowly twice.

  Paget sighed. “Unless they wrang it from Spear, though I doubt that, for the preparation was little. It was as though they had just got wind of matters and were desperate what to do. After all, none of their other people were warned.”

  “Then it’s simply a feeling you have? Some kind of intuition?”

  “You might say that. It is a concern.”

  Moriarty nodded. “We must talk to Spear.”

  “If he can talk. He’s badly hurt, Professor.”

  Spear had been taken to his own chambers and the women had stripped and bathed him and cleaned his wounds, putting linen rags smothered in picric ointment on the burns, and wrapping his damaged hands and fingernails in bandages spread with beeswax and sweet oil. (Mrs. Wright knew some of the simple healing arts of nursing.) They also gave him brandy in small sips, and by the time Moriarty and Paget arrived at the bedside, Spear was lying on the lip of sleep.

  “You will recover, Spear,” Moriarty said quietly, yet with great authority. “But you must tell us, did you break under torture? Did you blow on us, Spear? The truth will not hurt now.”

  Spear groaned, slowly opening his eyes. His voice was distant, but he was not delirious.

  “I told nothing … nothing.… Toward the end… they knew something was afoot.… Take care, there is someone close to you, Professor … someone was giving them word.…” He was too weak to continue, but in a last effort he breathed, “Bridget … where’s Bridget?”

  “She’s here and safe, Bert,” Paget leaned forward, his lips near to Spear’s ear. “She shall come to you directly.”

  He was sure that Spear did not hear Moriarty say softly, “After we’ve talked with her.”

  They went back to the Professor’s chambers, pausing on the way to speed men back to their rooms or whatever places they called home and send word that the girl Bridget should be brought to the Professor.

  After helping with Spear, Fanny Jones and Mary McNiel had taken Bridget in hand. They had made preparations in the kitchen to deal with the wounded, so there was a great deal of hot water, boiled upon the hobs and on top of the stove as well as in the big copper.

  They now locked the kitchen door, brought out the big tin bath and set to scrubbing the unhappy girl clean, toweling her dry, then washing her hair in a mixture Mary had learned of Sal Hodges—strong liquor ammonia, spirits of rosemary, tincture of cantharides, almond oil and lavender water.

  When the girl was dry, Mary McNiel rubbed at Bridget’s long hair while Fanny went off to her closet to find her one spare dress with an underskirt, long white drawers, stockings and shoes, in which they dressed the girl, combing out her hair and applying a little dry starch mixed with water and arrowroot to the livid bruise on her cheek. It was during these last stages of preparation that Paget arrived to say Bridget was required in the Professor’s room.

  She was, not unnaturally, frightened in the Professor’s presence, but his strange and quite mesmeric effect soon calmed her.

  “Tell us about yourself, Bridget,” he said to her, and she responded by telling them the story of how, at the age of seventeen, she had been sent by her father from Ireland to live with an aunt and uncle in Liverpool.

  Moriarty smiled and told her they would get on well, for his boyhood had been spent in Liverpool. She had been there for only a year when she met up with a young sailor called Raybet. He persuaded her to go with him to London, where she lived with him near the London docks, a situation of which she soon tired, for while he was only on short runs between London and the north coast of England, he began to spend more and more of his time with his cronies, leaving her to fend for herself. Money was always short and she admitted that for a while she had hawked herself and worse, for Bridget was a villain at heart.

  Moriarty then asked her where she thought either Green or Butler might be hiding, but she seemed to have no idea: all that appeared uppermost in her mind was the fact that she was dreadfully hungry and in need of rest. Moriarty softened, telling Paget to take her down to Kate Wright and Fanny Jones and see that she was fed and given a bed.

  At the door Bridget turned to thank the Professor.

  “There is one matter,” she said, fatigue fraying her voice. “They had a message this morning, before they got rough with Bert. It was brought by a boy I had not seen before, and after Mike Green read it he was blind angry. I heard them talking, and you were mentioned, sir. The message was from someone close to you—a woman, I think.”

  Paget closed the door again, ushering her back into the chair, where they carefully probed her with questions for the next half hour, discovering that Green and Butler had been expecting another message, which had failed to arrive. They also deduced that if there were a traitor, it could be only one of four people.

  After Paget had taken the girl down to the kitchen he returned to Moriarty’s chambers. Both men looked grave.

  “See that a guard is put on her door and mention none of this to the others,” the Professor ordered. “I don’t want her left with any of them for long periods.”

  “We have the prisoners taken at Nelson Street,” Paget said, meaning the two men and the boy they had caught going to the house and the man who had emerged before the assault.

  The remainder of Green’s and Butler’s men were left at the house, and many were now in police custody.

  “It would be best if we talked with them, I think. Tomorrow though, my mind is buzzing tonight.”

  It was the early hours of Tuesday morning before Paget lay close, though more silent than usual, beside the sweet form of Fanny Jones.

  Tuesday, April 10, to Thursday, April 12, 1894

  (CROW AMONG THE PIGEONS)

  THE OUTBREAK OF violence which had occurred during the night of April 9 caused Inspector Crow much concern. A number of innocent people had been injured, as well as many who were long removed from blamelessness. As always, those who were known villains offered little in the way of intelligence.

  It was clear that the violence had been caused by a head-on clash between two bands of rogues, and concern ran high at Scotland Yard, for there seemed to be much organization behind the villains.

  But Crow was more concerned about the matter which
had come to his attention with the name Druscovish: that was the important lead for him, so he handed over the question of Monday’s violence to his subordinates, instructing them to be present whenever possible at the interrogation of those concerned; to take note if the names of Moriarty or Colonel Moran drew any reaction; and to keep details, whivh were to be handed over to him for examination at leisure.

  Having relegated this authority, Angus McCready Crow set about his own investigations concerning the three former detectives, Druscovich, Meiklejohn and Palmer, and the unhappy part they had played in the de Goncourt scandal.

  The facts of the case were complex, and it took Crow much time to go through the files. In the early 1870’s there had been a plague of swindles and frauds, all bearing the same hallmark, and all concerned with horse racing.

  The method used is not unknown today. It operated mainly through advertisements placed in newspapers, both at home and abroad, which claimed that a company—usually with some notable names on the board of directors—was prepared to take the pain out of gambling on the sport of kings. All the punter had to do was send the money. The company would place the bets for him, offering a quick and easy return in winnings.

  The human race is ever gullible as far as easy winnings are concerned—people being all too eager to send hard cash. In many cases individuals received courteous receipts, others did not. Needless to say, nobody got any winnings.

  Certainly people complained, but when the company offices were investigated, all the police found was either an empty office or an accommodation address.

  By 1873 it was estimated that the swindle was netting a freezing £800,000 a year, a profit too high for the detective force to stand idle; so Chief Inspector Clarke, a man with a tidy if unimaginative mind, was put in charge of the case. Quickly it became apparent that Mr. Clarke had a great deal of trouble on his hands. During the months that followed, Clarke came within an ace of catching the gang, but by the time he got to the address supplied by unwilling victims, the perpetrators of the frauds had flown, leaving little trace but for the ashes of burned papers.

  At last the chief inspector was left with only one unsavory conclusion: Someone within his own force was warning the villains.

  Hard though this was to stomach, suspicion pointed in the direction of a sergeant called John Meiklejohn. But there was no hard evidence and no real clues regarding the villains. Clarke and his men sifted and searched, painstakingly going about their craft.

  Then the groundwork began to pay off. Two convicted criminals, a man called Walters—landlord of The Bunch of Grapes in Holborn—and an Edwin Murray, came under strong suspicion. Eventually a petty criminal laid charges against them for assault and in the process sang a long song connecting Walters and Murray with the turf frauds, together with a so-called mastermind named Kurr.

  Walters and Murray were arrested, but Kurr escaped by his teeth’s skin, having been warned in advance. Walters and Murray were tried on the assault charge, found not guilty and discharged, only to be rearrested on charges of conspiracy to defraud.

  The evidence against Meiklejohn being the gang’s man at the Yard was inconclusive, as indeed was the case against Walters and Murray. They were both given bail, which they broke, disappearing, it was rumored, to America.

  In the meantime the chief inspector received information from a Mr. Jonge, resident in the Isle of Wight. Jonge, as it turned out, told little, except that he had been asked by Walters to translate some newspaper advertisements for insertion into foreign papers. Needless to say, these advertisements concerned the turf frauds.

  No action could be taken against Meiklejohn, but as a precaution he was lent to the Midland Railway and given the rank of inspector with the company’s police.

  The whole fraudulent carbuncle revealed its second head in the winter of 1877, when a firm of lawyers, based in Paris, called on Superintendent Williamson, head of the detective force. Their client was the Comtesse de Goncourt, who, they suspected, had been swindled out of £10,000 by the English racing investors. The initial approach had been made by a Mr. Montgomery, who foolishly supplied the Comtesse with details of his address in London.

  Chief Inspector Clarke, who spoke no other language save his native tongue, handed the case over to Chief Inspector Nat Druscovich, the Criminal Investigation Department’s language expert.

  Druscovich set off to arrest Montgomery, but returned alone and unhappy. Clarke had told no one else that the arrest had been imminent; yet once more there had been prior warning—and this time without the help of Meiklejohn, who was busy dealing with the criminal tribulations of the Midland Railway.

  The finger could point to only one man—Druscovich, who was left in charge of the case. In a matter of days Druscovich appeared to have won back trust, for he traced some of the notes paid out on the Comtesse’s check. The trail led to Edinburgh where the notes had been cashed by a man answering the description of none other than the helpful Mr. Jonge, who had been so forthcoming at the time of Walters’ and Murray’s arrests.

  Jonge was shadowed and traced, with a man named Gifford, to the Queen’s Hotel, Bridge of Allan, where they had met up with another suspect—Inspector Meiklejohn. Druscovich was dispatched to make the arrest, again missing the criminals by a short head.

  Clarke and the superintendent immediately ordered both Druscovich and Meiklejohn to explain themselves in writing. Druscovich said that these criminals were known to be elusive and he was only fallible; Meiklejohn claimed that he had every right to be at the Queen’s Hotel, Bridge of Allan, as he was on company business, looking for a missing trunk. He had no idea he was talking with wanted men when he had shared a meal with Jonge and Gifford.

  Druscovich then took the action that led to his downfall, presumably in an attempt to show innocence. He forwarded three pieces of evidence to the Yard. First, some blotting paper taken from the hotel smoking room, upon which were the smudged, blotted words, “Keep the lame man out of the way.” Jonge was lame.

  Second, a telegram addressed to Mr. Gifford at the Queen’s Hotel, reading:

  IF SHANKS IS NEAR THE ISLE OF WIGHT LET HIM LEAVE AT ONCE

  AND SEE YOU. LETTER FOLLOWS. W. BROWN. LONDON.

  Jonge’s home was in Shanklin.

  Last there was a letter:

  Mr. William Gifford—

  Dear Sir.

  There is very strong particulars from Edinburgh, which I suppose you know of. They have the address at the shop here. It is also known that you were in London a day or two ago. Perhaps you had better see me, for things begin to look fishy. News may be given to the Isle of Wight—where Shanklin is. You know best. D goes to Wight tomorrow. Send this back. W. Brown, who was with you at the “Daniel Lambert.”

  The handwriting was that of the most senior and trusted officer in the CID—Chief Inspector William Palmer.

  A few days later Jonge, Kurr, Murray, and three others were arrested by the Dutch police in Rotterdam and brought back to London for trial. Jonge was sentenced to fifteen years’ penal servitude; Kurr and three others got ten years apiece; and Murray eighteen months as an accessory.

  Within a few weeks Druscovich, Meiklejohn and Palmer drew two years apiece, and even Chief Inspector Clarke was implicated by Kurr—a particularly vicious and slanderous attempt, which failed.

  Inspector Crow mulled over the files, reading the details three times. There was this one shred of evidence, now linking Moriarty with the event, coming from Nat Druscovich’s deathbed. It was a matter for serious thought and detailed investigation. More than ever Inspector Crow yearned for the kind of crime indexes and registration systems the Continental police had at their fingertips. He was also starting to wonder about Moriarty, possibly for the first time in any serious context.

  It was essential that he should talk quickly to at least one of the main cast of characters who had been involved in the de Goncourt scandal. Even if they could be found he had no desire to talk with Jonge or Kurr or any of that ilk. He w
ould have to make his first appeals to the sensibilities of either Meiklejohn or Palmer.

  Within half an hour he was in possession of the fact that the last report on Palmer was that he managed a public house in Horton. Crow believed in striking with a hot iron and immediately made the tedious journey—to no avail. On arrival, late in the afternoon, he discovered that Palmer had only recently given up the public house in order to emigrate to Australia and a new life. It puzzled Crow, for Palmer must by now be almost sixty years of age—an odd time of life to start growing new roots.

  It was late when the inspector got back into London. He collected the day’s reports—concerning the violence of Monday night—and wearily retraced his steps toward the tender charms of Mrs. Sylvia Cowles in King Street. On the following day he would start looking for Meikeljohn.

  At a little before ten o’clock on Tuesday morning Moriarty called a short conference with Ember, Lee Chow, Paget and Parker. Spear had spent an uneasy night, was still in much pain, but the fever that had initially swept over him appeared to have abated.

  Lee Chow was entrusted with getting the loot taken from Togger and Krebitz over to Solly Abrahams, together with a message that Moriarty himself would be seeing the old fence within twenty-four hours.

  Parker, who was still making inquiries about Inspector Crow, received orders to send his men out and about to judge opinion in the underworld, to reinforce Moriarty’s case, and to continue the search for Green and Butler. Ember’s job lay in contacting the trio of thieves, Fisher, Clark and Gay, ordering them to the Limehouse headquarters for conference with their leader.

  “I have to talk with them about the Harrow business,” the Professor said. “There’s swag enough in that for all.” Then, turning to Paget, “I shall need you with me, as you have the lie of the land.”