by David Field
‘I must apologise for the means by which I eventually acquired your presence, Inspector, but it would seem that the first two invitations were not to your liking.’
‘Neither was the third,’ Percy replied gruffly, only partly mollified by the gift of scones, ‘and I’m no longer an Inspector at the Yard. Presumably your trained ape knew that, since he seemed to know a lot more about me during our discussions on the way down here. Largely one way, of course, since Melville seems to enjoy the sound of his own voice.’
‘It’s thanks to my “trained ape”, as you call him, that I knew of your attempted resignation,’ Ridley advised him with a knowing smile.
‘Attempted?’ Percy queried.
Ridley nodded. ‘You didn’t seriously think that I’d allow such a staunch guardian of public safety to leave the team at a time when he’s most needed, did you? Your resignation letter was forwarded to me at my request and has been declined.’
‘After what I said in open court about the rotten state of society’s arse?’
‘Particularly after that, and for two reasons. The first is that you’re perfectly correct and are clearly committed to wiping that arse. The second is that you now have a reputation within Scotland Yard for being a shit-stirring revolutionary.’
‘And that makes it both safe and advisable to insist that I remain?’
‘Absolutely. Help yourself to your fourth scone, and let me explain, since even I need to remind myself of why I’m taking such a radical course.’
While Percy spread jam half an inch thick on the largest remaining scone, Ridley began. ‘If I were to say “Anarchist”, what mental image would that conjure up for you?’
‘Bomb-chucking lunatics bent on bringing down our government structure,’ Percy replied with his mouth full.
‘You would not concede that “Anarchists” might be ordinary folk who simply wish to see an end to the tyranny of government?’
Percy thought for a moment while he cleared his mouth of scone, then his brow creased in thought. ‘As I well know from my years in the Met, if we don’t have some form of government, then it becomes the law of the jungle, in which the weak get trodden into the ground by the strong, who are not predisposed towards attending to the needs, or indeed the continued existence, of those weaker than themselves. That was what I was banging on about in court when those two women were being sentenced. They’d been let down by a system that had allowed others stronger than them to take cruel advantage of their helplessness.’
‘Precisely,’ Ridley smiled. ‘Which is why you’re just the man for the job.’
‘What job?’
‘You would agree, I assume from what you just said, that we cannot for one moment contemplate an absence of government in this country? A state of affairs in which the powerful, or those with the biggest gang of hired thugs, rule the lives of the weak by terror and extortion?’
‘Of course I agree,’ Percy replied testily. ‘I’ve spent my entire police career dealing with gangs of thugs, mostly by buckling them and sending them for trial, imprisonment and the gallows.’
‘And on occasions you’ve been known to take the law into your own hands, like some form of licensed vigilante, employing actions that have led to the deaths of suspects before they could even be brought before a magistrate? “The Ripper”, for example, or that East End enforcer who was torn apart by the mob in the street? Then there was that art dealer who went under a railway locomotive.’
‘Those were all unfortunate accidents,’ Percy insisted. ‘I didn’t set out to have them killed — well, perhaps in the case of Michael Maguire, but even so…’
‘You don’t have to justify yourself to me, Percy,’ Ridley smiled, employing his Christian name to good effect at precisely the appropriate moment. ‘But we’re agreed that, despite its failings, you’d rather see a Government in place than have no Government at all?’
‘Of course,’ Percy agreed. ‘The alternative is unthinkable.’
‘And you’d be prepared to work in order to ensure the continued existence of some form of government within Britain? Commons, Lords and Queen preferably, but some form of government anyway?’
‘Where is this leading?’ Percy asked, intrigued despite himself.
It fell silent for a moment while Ridley maintained a dramatic silence by means of refilling his coffee cup. Then he dropped the bombshell.
‘We have reason to believe that there’s a concerted plot to throw England into sufficient chaos to allow a foreign power to move in.’
Percy stopped chewing in order to allow his mouth to fall open.
‘You mean an enemy invasion?’
‘Of sorts, yes. But not immediately, not directly, and not overtly.’
‘Is this when you tell me that what you have to say must not be repeated?’ Percy said with faint sarcasm, to be met by a most unpleasant smile from the Home Secretary.
‘We passed that point some minutes ago, and I was relying on your innate discretion and integrity. You may have acquired a reputation recently for going off at the mouth, but I know enough about the real Percy Enright to feel secure in the knowledge that you won’t repeat a word of what I’m about to tell you to any unauthorised person. Of course, if you do, you’ve already met Superintendent Melville and his deputy ape.’
‘Before you disclose any State secrets,’ Percy cautioned him, ‘you presumably have some task for me at the end of it?’
‘A task, a reward and what some would deem a bribe,’ Ridley smiled. ‘Now for the gory details. Perhaps laced with a little local history.’
‘Will we need more coffee?’
‘No, but perhaps some brandy to go with it.’
Ridley waved his hand in the air, and a uniformed manservant appeared from the shrubbery in which he’d been hiding. Ridley ordered a decanter of brandy and two glasses, then smiled at the unspoken question written across Percy’s face.
‘You’re correct, Inspector. Manning makes excellent coffee, knows which brandy I prefer, and is an excellent marksman and bodyguard who can lose himself in the bushes. He’ll ensure our ongoing privacy while we continue our conversation.’
Once the brandy was poured, Ridley looked Percy firmly in the eyes and continued.
‘Of the various organisations dedicated to bringing Britain to its knees, you perhaps best know the Fenians, since you had to deal with them when you were investigating the untimely demise of Lord Stranmillis.’
‘Only indirectly,’ Percy conceded. ‘They were simply the hired help of others when the time came to silence his Lordship because of what he could reveal about the sexual inclinations of a senior Board of Trade official.’
‘For the record, that man is no longer in his former post,’ Ridley advised Percy with a smile. ‘We knew anyway. But you will at least have learned that a certain section of the Irish who’ve settled here in England are capable of extreme violence?’
‘They did away with the Irish Secretary and his deputy in Dublin some years ago, I remember that,’ Percy replied, ‘but isn’t their agenda simply an independent Ireland, free of English control? Why would they encompass the entire overthrow of the English Government?’
‘Because they’re stupid, hot-headed and easily manipulated,’ Ridley replied. ‘They can be persuaded that by throwing in their lot with others they can use a free Ireland as a bargaining counter. In reward for their muscle, and their talent with explosives, they’ll be allowed to set up an independent Ireland when the English Government is brought down.’
‘Persuaded by whom?’
‘We’ll get to that later. Now let’s consider the up and coming trade unions. You’ve had trouble with those many times in the Met, have you not?’
‘Mainly in a public order context.’ Percy nodded. ‘There was that Trafalgar Square riot a few years back, ostensibly in support of the Match Girls Strike, although we had it on good authority that this was just an excuse for a punch-up with uniformed constables. Are you saying that they were ma
nipulated as well?’
‘You’ve presumably heard of the Fenian Barracks?’
‘Who hasn’t, inside the Met?’ Percy frowned. ‘It’s a block of tenements in Poplar that’s sent more Met officers to hospital than any other comparable block anywhere else in the East End, and that’s saying something. It’s a good example of what we were talking about earlier — rampant lawlessness, no respect for authority, and almost impossible to police. In short, a small sample of what to expect if law and order breaks down in England. But what’s the connection with the Trafalgar Square riots?’
‘Over twenty of those Match Girls came from “the Barracks” area,’ Ridley advised him. ‘The Irish saw their chance to stir up a mob, ostensibly in support of downtrodden working girls, but in reality designed to test the ability of the Met to resist a mass riot in a public place.’
‘I begin to see what you mean,’ Percy frowned. ‘One group of the disaffected and desperate whipped into a frenzy by another such group with a little more brainpower. At that rate, most of the East End could be considered a powder keg waiting for the match. Some revolutionary English loudmouth with sufficient powers of oratory to light the fuse.’
‘And what makes you think it’s confined to London, or even England?’ Ridley said, to which Percy had no response other than polite silence. ‘And why do you think that my Government is so opposed to such liberal immigration laws?’ Ridley added by way of reinforcement. ‘If you read any newspaper, you’ll be aware that Europe has been the scene of dreadful outrages in recent years, mainly using this new dynamite stuff that’s capable of blowing entire buildings apart. French cafes, Italian museums, a Spanish opera house, and Swiss hotels. To add to the dramatic effect, several high-profile victims such as heads of state, assassinated by lunatics who weren’t afraid to die in the process.’
‘What does that have to do with Salisbury’s anti-immigration stance?’ Percy asked.
‘Because we grant asylum to these madmen,’ Ridley replied heatedly. ‘Take a look at those who’ve been allowed to settle in London alone — Jews, Frenchmen, Russians, Italians to name but a few. How can we tell who they really are, and why they’re really here? It was, after all, a Frenchman — Martial Bourdin — who managed to kill himself while attempting to blow up the Greenwich Observatory. Then there’s that dreadful “Club Autonomie” off the Tottenham Court Road that Bourdin frequented almost nightly. We’ve had that under observation for some time, but it didn’t stop Bourdin, and it won’t stop the next lunatic who’s prepared to die for a cause that someone else’s given him.’
‘You want me to work under cover among immigrant communities?’ Percy asked sceptically, but Ridley smiled as he shook his head.
‘We’ll leave that to Melville and his ferrets. What I want you for is something much subtler.’
Chapter Four
‘I knew you had a brother,’ Jack said as he and Esther sat drinking tea and munching on slices of cheese toast that Nell had left out for them before going for a walk with her ‘young man’ Billy, ‘because you told me about him when we first got together, but you haven’t made mention of him since. Wasn’t he in the army or something?’
‘He was, the last I heard, in a letter from somewhere in Africa, but that was years ago, before we were even married.’
‘So you weren’t particularly close, even after your parents died in that river accident?’
‘Not even before that. He was two years older than me, and a big strong boy who learned to fight because he was Jewish, in the days when there were all sorts of different families living in Spitalfields. Believe it or not, it was respectable in those days, and the older, more established, families, resented the “Yids” who moved in and began to make money, like my parents. Anyway, Abe used to delight in showing me how big and brave he was by pulling my long hair, which was usually done up in ringlets in those days. Then when my parents died he took off and enrolled in some sort of military school. He was seventeen by then, and presumably he fulfilled his ambition to be a soldier, because the last letter I got he was serving in some Guards regiment or other, and about to go into battle in some unpronounceable place in North Africa.’
‘He obviously survived that,’ Jack observed, ‘since he appears to be back in London. That private investigator’s office is in Aldgate, so presumably Abe was living in the City somewhere when he hired him. We’ll no doubt get more information when he writes to you, as you gave permission for him to do.’
‘Are you sure you don’t mind?’
‘Why should I? You’ve put up with my family for the past ten years, so it’s the least I can do. He’s your older brother, you said?’
‘Yes, by two years, so I suppose he’ll be in his mid-thirties by now, and probably ready to leave the army, if he hasn’t already. I wonder what he’ll do for a living.’
‘A lot of former soldiers join the police,’ Jack advised her, ‘so assuming that he’s got a clean record and a good discharge report from his regimental senior officer, I might be able to find him something in the Met, if he’s interested. They’ve been known to bend the maximum age requirement for enlistment if a man’s physically fit.’
‘I’m not sure that I want all my family exposed to danger,’ Esther frowned.
‘Well, you can cross Uncle Percy off that list,’ Jack reminded her, ‘although it’s going to seem strange for me, knowing that he’s no longer down there at the Yard and only a wire away.’
‘Better get used to it,’ Esther said as she snuggled closer to him.
‘A pity you dulled your appetite with all those scones.’ Ridley smiled across the dining table inside the well-appointed country mansion.
‘Not sufficiently to pass up this excellent salmon,’ Percy all but purred, ‘although the lettuce and tomato may prove to be something of a challenge. And I’ll leave the potatoes to our fellow diners.’
William Melville smiled politely but said nothing, while Sidney Reilly appeared not to have heard. The butler poured the wine, and Ridley raised his glass in a toast.
‘To Her Majesty.’ As the others echoed his words, and hands were restored to knives and forks, Ridley took the toast as his cue. ‘Appropriate, really, in view of what I have to say next.’ It fell dutifully silent until Ridley looked directly across at Percy. ‘You recall the fuss and pomp that surrounded the Queen’s Golden Jubilee celebrations almost ten years ago?’
Percy nodded. ‘It was just about my last job in Hackney. I’d been attached to the Yard for a year or two by then, but I’d been a uniformed constable in that area for several years, so they put me in charge of the detachment keeping an eye on the revellers in Victoria Park. We did a busy line in drunk and disorderly, public indecency, pick-pocketing and soliciting for the purposes of prostitution, but nothing dramatic.’
‘You had a quieter day than me,’ Melville observed bitterly.
‘And me,’ Sidney Reilly confirmed. Ridley regarded them with a tolerant smile, then let Percy in on the secret.
‘It’s not generally known, but there was a Fenian plot to blow up the Queen and all the assembled dignitaries during the 1887 Golden Jubilee ceremony in Westminster Abbey. Their “main man” was an Irish loony called Millen, but fortunately for us he’d been on our payroll for some years, and he was encouraged to continue with the pretence, for reasons which I’ll leave Melville here to explain, since he was at the centre of it all.’
Melville cleared his throat somewhat portentously, then picked up the story.
‘You’ll be aware, of course, that for years Scotland Yard has maintained an “Irish Branch”, since you yourself have crossed paths with them several times in the course of your work with the “Political Branch”. I was a member of the Irish Branch, and I was the one who, shall we say, “cultivated” Millen, who was highly regarded by the Fenians because of his previously demonstrated talents with dynamite. I turned him into a paid spy for the Government, then encouraged him to become the leader of the “Jubilee Plot” as we
named it. This was for two reasons, the first being to prevent anyone else being given the job, and the second being the opportunity to draw others into the net. Millen was highly regarded by other members of the Fenian Brotherhood, and one by one they stepped out of the shadows to join him.’
‘Quite a haul,’ Percy muttered respectfully.
Melville nodded. ‘Also very risky. As you can imagine, there was fierce debate as to whether we should close down the entire operation days before the Westminster Abbey ceremony, or let it run until the last minute, in order to capture the conspirators from the United States who were bringing over the dynamite, along with two men delegated to detonate it. I argued strongly that we should let it continue until the very last moment and thank God I was proved right. We nabbed the lot of them, and the long-term consequence of our success, after much debate in Home Office circles, was the emergence of the “Special Branch” of which I’m now the head.’
‘And the Queen had no idea what had been going on, probably literally under her feet?’ Percy asked.
Melville shook his head. ‘Not even to this day.’
‘And therein lies the problem,’ Ridley joined in. ‘Her Majesty was so delighted with how the Golden Jubilee bunfight went that she’s ordered another one for June of next year, to be called the “Diamond Jubilee”, to mark the fact that a few weeks ago she became Britain’s longest ever reigning monarch.’
‘And you’re worried that the Fenians will try again?’ Percy said as he extracted a salmon bone delicately from his mouth with the aid of his fork.
Ridley frowned. ‘If it were just a matter of Fenians, we’re pretty sure that we could forestall any assassination attempts. But it’s much wider than that these days, with Anarchists coming out of the woodwork daily. We now have to worry about the trade unions, these women who think they should be allowed to vote, some sort of revolutionary movement that recently took off in Russia, and God knows how many madmen with perceived grievances against the Establishment and access to a revolver.’
