by John Gardner
‘The best. Spear’s got the place watched from the shop across the road, and Bob the Nob is listening to the workmen we got the word from originally.’
‘You arranged any signs? If it’s not clear?’
‘Ben Tuffnell’s still at Edmonton. If there’s danger before we leave, he’s to be singing drunk across from the house. The Mower he’ll be singing.’
Moriarty nodded a dismissal, but as Ember reached the door, he issued one further command. ‘Bathe yourself, Ember, if you are to stay here. I’ll not have this house stinking of fartleberries and last summer’s fish.’
Indeed, the Professor must have issued further orders, for Ember had hardly reached the room lately occupied by Harry Allen when Martha Pearson was up to tell him that his bath was drawn and Mrs Spear had laid out fresh towels, a bar of Sunlight soap and a scrubbing brush for him.
On the following morning a letter arrived from Paris for Professor Carl Nicol – the learned American gentleman living at Five Albert Square.
Dear Sir – the letter read,
We are settled in here very snug. While Pierre is still drinking like a funnel, he is doing at least four hours work each day. He tries to excuse himself constantly, and is often complaining about the light and it not being good enough, but I see to it that he gets on. It is a fair treat to watch him paint and I am certain that you will be more than satisfied with the result. The wood was marked as per your instructions.
I have also seen to it that he has not gone abroad unaccompanied. I have gone with him on all his visits to see the real thing and you can rest assured that everything else will be done exactly as you ordered.
I remain sir,
Your obedient servant,
H. Allen
LONDON:
Monday, 16 November – Monday, 23 November 1896
(The cracking of the Cornhill crib)
The Jacobs brothers had found just the place over in Bermondsey. A building that had been used as part storehouse, part offices for a small chain of grocery shops that had gone bankrupt a year before.
It had been on the market for some time, but nobody had snapped it up as the site was damp and unfit for expansion. It had never been much of a place for storing groceries either, for it backed onto a rubbish tip. However, it stood apart, some way from the nearest row of cottages; the locks and bars were all secure and there was a small yard and a stable at the back.
After some haggling, Bertram Jacobs paid over £200 of the Professor’s money and the deeds were drawn up in double quick time. Lee Chow rounded up some of his yellow brethren and, in a matter of a few days, the place was scrubbed clean as a whistle; a few licks of paint were added here and there, while Harkness, the Professor’s driver, took a couple of loads of cheap furniture over in the back of a hired cart.
During the week before Ember was due back at the Edmonton house, Spear saw to it that the black maria they had been constructing in a nearby stables, was taken over and put in the yard, and on the Saturday, the Professor himself paid the Bermondsey place a visit, to pronounce it good enough, providing those who had to stay there could put up with the stench from the nearby tanneries and leatherworkers’ shops.
By this time Terremant had recruited more punishers, there were facilities for cooking at Bermondsey, and provisions were laid in for a fair period.
The watch was still going on across the Cornhill from the jeweller’s, and Spear had managed to get the police uniforms into the shop.
On the night of Monday, 16th, Ember, carrying the brief bag containing Bolton’s well-swaddled tools, went to the Angel by hansom and walked the short distance to Schleifstein’s house. He got a glimpse of Hoppy at the Angel; Sim the Scarecrow was still trading on his sores; Blind Fred and Ben Tuffnell were on the lurk. Apart from them, Ember was now on his own. As he hauled at the dirty brass bell-pull, he briefly thought of Bob the Nob over in the City, and of the invisible network of lurkers through which any danger signal had to come. He also thought of Moriarty’s last words to him before he left Albert Square.
‘If you get Schleifstein for me, Ember, you’ll never want for hard cash again. If you fail, you will not be needing any.’
Franz opened the door. ‘So, it is this week then?’
‘Friday night,’ said Ember as the door closed behind him.
It rained all day on Friday, 20 November. Not the foggy drizzle normal for London at that time of year, but a lashing torrent which hurled walls of water up the wider main streets, and flooded the narrow and more secret alleys of the metropolis. The runnels became small rushing streams and waterfalls sluiced off the rooftops, filling the gutters and creating a havoc of pools and local flooding where streets were uncobbled or badly made up.
Traffic slowed down and jammed in all the worst bottlenecks, while pedestrians fought their way through the streets, as though grappling with the bayonets of water.
By late afternoon the downpour eased a little, but by then most of those who had to be out and about in London were soaked through. Not so Bob the Nob.
Bob the Nob was better known by one of his many aliases, Robert Lamb, Robert Betterton and Robert Richards being but three, and Bob the Nob being the name under which he was known by family people. A slim, grey-haired, not quite distinguished-looking fellow of forty years or so, he was a frequenter of public houses and hostelries in all parts of the capital, yet never known as a ‘local’ in any of them. If he drank in Brixton, for instance, he would talk much of his business in Bethnal Green; or an evening spent in some Camden Town boozer would find him often referring to the little place he had in Woolwich.
His memory was accurate and he had a nose for a well-stocked crib. When drinking in City of London pubs he was usually known as a cheerful fellow who had a nice little grocery trade somewhere over Clapham way. In fact, the Nob lived in two rooms above a butcher’s shop in Clare Market, from whence he would sally forth each day to pick up prime titbits of intelligence. He was smart, a dandy almost, and placid in temperament. On Friday, the 20th, he stayed in bed most of the day, listening to the rain washing the streets, drumming against his window and on the false front of the butcher’s shop below.
He was the lurker who had first nosed the possibilities concerning Freeland & Son. Tonight his job was simple: to drink a few glasses in Dirty Dick’s, the pub built over the old wine and spirit vaults in Bishopsgate. That was where the skilled workmen from Freeland’s went after work on a Friday, and he had, in effect, promised to meet with a couple of them around eight. If anything was wrong, young Saxby would be waiting at a flash house in Whitechapel. What he did with any message passed on was no concern of Bob the Nob.
The saloon bar was busy when he arrived, mostly with office people lingering after the day’s work was over. A large number did not have to come in on the Saturday, and some would make a night of it before returning to their wives with what was left of their wages.
By half-past eight none of the jeweller’s craftsmen had appeared and the Nob began to sense the first twinges of concern. Nine o’clock and still no sign. It was nearly half-past the hour before they came trouping in, all four of them, tired and looking glum.
He greeted his particular cronies cheerfully and with some comment on the lateness of the hour. Old Freeland had kept them, they said, and they were none too happy about it. Work which had to be finished by Monday, for collection, was not yet done. They were not due to go in on the Saturday, but now that had been changed. Tomorrow would have to be a full working day.
For the sake of appearances, the Nob stayed on until just aften ten, lingering by the door to pass a word or two with another acquaintance before going out into the night. The rain had started again. Not with the same force as earlier in the day, but enough to quickly soak the shoulders of his greatcoat and spray into his face, dripping from his eyebrows, forcing him to blink away the drops and run the side of his hands across the lids. Head down, he strode out towards Cornhill and Leadenhall Street, legs pumping automatically,
hands thrust deep in greatcoat pockets, mind running on the simple chore of passing a message to Saxby for Ember. ‘They’ll be working tomorrow,’ was all he had to say. Then home, perhaps with one of the molls who hung about near Clare Market. A night horizontalizing would do him good.
The Nob was crossing Aldgate when the hansom struck him.
It was a combination of bad weather and worse luck. Mainly the weather, for the rain was hard in the cabby’s eyes and he glimpsed the figure in the dark patch of road a shade too late. He was able to rein his horse sharply to the right, a quick action which saved the Nob from being trampled under hoof, but not quick enough to stop the wheel catching him a nasty blow, sending him scudding and tumbling across the wet road where he lay, splayed out, unmoving: still as death.
They all wore their dark clothes with the tight jackets as Ember had directed. Sitting in the little dining-room of the Edmonton house, the five men went through their particular jobs for a last time – Evans, still looking surly; Franz; the neat German; Peter, and his portly dishevelled companion whose name was Claus; and, of course, Ember who did most of the chatting.
Wellborn and the greasy-haired boy were somewhere in the house, and Schleifstein had gone to bed. The buck cabbie was due to pick them up in his growler at one o’clock and would bring them back later. Tomorrow, when they forced the safe, he would leave the cab ready for Evans to pick up for loading with the swag and the fast away from the site. All was set.
The nobbler, Evans, was to crow for them, and drive the cab on the following night; Peter and Claus were the labourers, doing the heavy work; Franz would act as go-between from Ember to Evans and vice versa.
‘There’s no need to be all of a rush,’ Ember told them for the twentieth time in three days. ‘That’s the beauty of it: taking our time over two nights. Tonight we get the lie of the land, cut up into the shop; then tomorrow we crack it proper.’
There had not been a sound out of normal in the street, and Ember felt rightly confident. No signals. All clear. Spear and Terremant would be watching from the shop across the road in Cornhill and it would not take more than a couple of hours to cut up through the floor. Probably less. Away from Edmonton at one. Back by five. All done in darkness.
He felt in his pocket for the brandy flask and took a swig. One last look at old Bolton’s instruments, all packed and swaddled with cloth to baffle the noise. Chisels; four jemmies; American auger, short saw and blades, a set of bettys; spiders and double-enders; an outsider; a cutter and heads; rope, and the brass jack-in-the-box. On top, the dark lantern which would be their only light on the premises.*
The buck cabbie had been paid in advance. It was always the way: honour among thieves did not often stretch to matters of cash. He had no idea where the robbery was to be. Nor did he wish to know. He would drop them in Bishopsgate and at half-past four in the morning would drive a set return route, first picking up Ember with his tools, then the others at intervals – two in Houndsditch and the other pair in the Minories. Then back, by a circuitous series of doubles, to Edmonton.
As they came down the steps to the cab, Ember thought he had a glimpse of Ben Tuffnell’s white face in the darkness of the wall at the other side of the road. No signals. All safe. Just before they left the house he had hauled out his watch-chain and the old silver hunter showed one on the dot.
The Nob felt cold, wet and in pain. It was dark. There were voices. People were lifting him and the pain ran through his body in a great unspeakable wave. Next he was on some sort of cart. But that was only for a short time, for he lapsed into the darkness once more.
Then the pain came again, as though someone was crushing then wrenching at his shoulder. Time was unimportant and a lifespan could have passed, like a fevered dream, his mind dipping in and out of muzzied knowing and nightmare sleep. Then, lights and the smell of disinfectant, something holding down his right arm and shoulder. More light. Waking to strange surroundings and … angels? White gliding angels.
‘There, you are well,’ said one of the angels bending over him. ‘You are all right.’
‘What …?’ His mouth was dry and he wanted to vomit.
‘You have been in an accident,’ said the angel. ‘The police brought you here.’
At the mention of the police, Bob the Nob became fully awake. He was lying in a tiled white room, on a leather couch. The angels were women. Nurses.
‘You are at St Bartholomew’s Hospital,’ said the nurse, her face close to his. ‘Your shoulder has been broken but the surgeon has set it now. You’ll live to argue with hansoms again.’
It all came back, and the Nob moved, trying to sit up, but the pain stabbed down like a red-hot lance. As it subsided he asked, ‘What’s the time?’
‘You must not worry about the time. They’ll be taking you up to the ward in a moment.’
‘What’s the time? It’s very important.’
‘Very well. Just gone midnight. You’ve been unconscious for quite some time.’
He felt more shaky and the pain returned, in smaller stabs this time.
‘I can’t stay here,’ he gasped. ‘Can’t afford it. Not a hospital.’
‘Don’t you worry. They’ll talk to you about that in the morning. You really did have a rather nasty tumble.’
She was a sharp-faced woman, all starch. Starch all through, thought the Nob. Starch everywhere, I shouldn’t wonder.
‘Got to get a message,’ he took a deep breath.
‘To your wife?’
‘Yes,’ he grabbed at the idea.
‘Well, I’ll have to take your particulars before you go up and we’ll see what can be done about your wife. The police will want details anyhow. I really don’t know. You’re the fourth accident case we’ve had in tonight, they’ll have to do something about the traffic soon. Those cabbies all drive too fast and there are too many people on the roads. They’re not built for it, you know.’ She touched his head lightly as if feeling for fever. ‘You just rest here. I’ll be back in a few minutes.’
She was away, across the tiled floor, a whisper of starched authority.
The pain was very bad, but he managed to get to his feet, the room spinning and settling. Then another wave of nausea. The sopping wet greatcoat was lying on a chair, but he would not be able to get into it, his right arm and shoulder being strapped up as it was. No matter, thought the Nob. If I need other treatment, I’ll spin them a yarn down at the Eastern Dispensary in the Chapel. Grabbing his coat with the left hand, gritting his teeth against the white pain which flashed through him with each step, the Nob shuffled towards the door. Outside there was a wide hallway and some glass doors. A lot of bustle, for they seemed to be bringing two new cases in on stretchers. He caught a glimpse of his nurse giving a hand.
The way across to the exit was clear, so summoning all speed, the Nob lurched to the glass doors and was away. Outside, the rain still tippled down and seemed, for a moment, to clear his head. Then the nausea returned, and the pain making each step agony.
It was after one before he got down to the flash house in the Chapel. There were several vagrant wrecks there, and a couple of coves boasting of a blag they’d done up West. Saxby was asleep on a bench in the corner. The Nob gave him the message and he was off, looking white-faced and worried with dark circles under his eyes. It was a fair way to Edmonton.
The Nob watched him go, then, at last, he was sick and one of the coves propped him up in a corner and fed him brandy.
The rear entrance of Freeland & Son was reached through a narrow lane off Bishopsgate leading into a tiny yard. The back door was secure enough, protected by iron plates, but to the right of this some area steps descended to a cellar door which nobody bothered with.
The yard itself was littered with junk: old boxes, packing cases and such, as though it was the common dumping ground for the immediate area.
The beatman was well clear when they unloaded from the cab – Ember whispering instructions to the cabbie – and they were down t
he lane and into the yard within a couple of minutes, leaving Evans at the Bishopsgate end, for it was a perfect vantage point, dark and unlit. Ember reckoned they had about ten minutes to get in before the copper came down Bishopsgate again.
The dark lantern only gave a tiny circle of light, but enough for using a betty on the simple lock. There was always a way in, Ember mused as he worked at the tumblers. Some had safes with uncrackable doors but backs to them like thin tin. Some protected the main doors and forgot about the cellars below, or even the offices above. The lock gave way to his simple seduction, and Ember pushed the door open. It creaked slightly and there was a rusty groan from one of the hinges. Inside, the place smelled of dust, damp and the neglect of ages.
He swung the little circle of light around the cellar, peering about him in the hope that his eyes would more quickly adjust to the darkness. Like the yard outside, the cellar was full of rubbish: a couple of large wooden packing cases, a pile of old boxes, a peeling display sign (Gilding, Plating and Engraving on the Shortest Notice. Repairs Expeditiously Executed by Scientific Workmen), part of an old window grille, made obsolescent by the iron shutters round the front of the shop.
‘Stick by the door,’ Ember whispered to Franz. ‘Listen well.’
Then, in dumb show, he motioned Peter and Claus to close up with him as he moved into the cellar, the sovereign of light playing on the joists, beams and planking above.
The cellar was long and narrow, and there, some four paces inside, directly above their heads, was the telltale square of heavy bolts which marked out the iron bed upon which the safe was set in the workshop. He signalled for the two Germans to drag one of the packing cases just forward of the square, then quietly, and with no undue haste, Ember opened the brief bag and located the American auger, screwing his largest bit in place.
He then passed the lantern to Peter, climbed onto the packing case and began to drill upwards through the wooden ceiling, turning his face to one side once the drill was in place to avoid the sawdust and splinters.
