The Fleet Street Murders

by Charles Finch

  His letter was brief.

  Lenox,

  I once met Simon Pierce at a party—crashing bore. Nevertheless, one does feel a certain sorrow. Are you doing anything about this? I would like to help, if so. Hope you had a jolly Christmas and everything like that.

  Dallington

  This note raised in Lenox a sense of guilt, which combined with the poor chances of his campaign made him feel suddenly that his real place was on the trail of whoever had murdered the two London journalists, not here courting votes among people who had no affection for his presence.

  “From Dallington,” he said. “Asks about the journalists. I do feel I should be there, rather.”

  McConnell did something strange then—he literally smacked his forehead. “How could I have forgotten, Lenox! I come bearing news.”

  “What is it?”

  “We had just spoken about the matter,” said McConnell with a bemused shake of his head. “It’s the drink—it puts me awkward—I’m not . . .” He trailed off nervously. “My memory.”

  “For the love of Christ, what is it?” Lenox asked.

  “Hiram Smalls? The chap in jail?”

  “Yes?”

  “He’s dead, apparently. Just before midnight yesterday evening. I was in the train station when I heard about it.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  L

  enox was stunned. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes,” said McConnell.

  “You’re absolutely certain of that?”

  “They were selling an extra edition of the paper with a story to that effect—I’m sure of that anyway.”

  “Did you buy it?”

  McConnell looked embarrassed. “I’m afraid I was—not myself,” he said.

  With any luck the late papers from the night before might make it up to Stirrington tonight. Otherwise he would have to wait until the morning. It was maddening, just maddening. For a tenth of a second every fiber in Lenox’s body strained against the town and his task there.

  “What did it say? Do you remember? Murder? Suicide? Was it unclear?”

  Rather lamely, McConnell answered, “Only that he had just died, actually.”

  Then Lucy arrived with a bubbling pie of some kind or other for Lenox, which despite his focus on Smalls was a welcome sight after a morning of what had been cold campaigning.

  “Lucy, a moment—do you take telegrams here?”

  “No, sir, but the boots will take a telegram to the post office for a small tip.”

  “Could you send him over?”

  The boots, when he appeared, turned out to be a lad of not more than thirteen or so, with a pronounced overbite and black hands from his work shining shoes. Lenox had quickly scribbled out a message and an address, and he handed these to the boots along with a large tip, in addition to the money it would cost to send the telegram. Admonishingly, he instructed the boy not to lose it or to tarry on his way to the post office. Thinking it over, he took back the tip and promised to hold it until the lad returned with a receipt. Perhaps this wasn’t the most trusting thing to do, but Lenox remembered what he had been like at thirteen.

  “To whom did you write?” asked McConnell, who was looking slightly ill again.

  “Dallington.”

  “Telling him?”

  “Asking him for information, primarily. Also telling him to keep an eye on matters there.” Lenox looked at his pocket watch. “I wish I had time to wait for a reply, but I’m afraid I’m scheduled to speak soon. Excuse me, will you?”

  “Where?” asked McConnell.

  He received no reply, though, for Lenox had already walked up to Crook at the bar for a brief consultation. Either Crook or Hilary had introduced him before all of his speeches so far, but Hilary was gone, and Crook was working; another member of the Liberal committee, Sandy Smith, was going to meet Lenox at his first speech and accompany him for the rest of the day.

  “I must go,” Lenox said to McConnell. “I’ll see you for supper?”

  “Can’t I tag along and help you campaign?”

  “Tomorrow, certainly—but have another afternoon of rest, won’t you?”

  McConnell still looked disheveled, and Lenox, though he had never been embarrassed by a friend before, felt he couldn’t march around Stirrington with the doctor now. How politics had already changed him! It wasn’t clear whether McConnell understood Lenox’s motives, but without any further protest he agreed to spend the afternoon on his own.

  Lenox’s mind fairly swarmed with ideas. It would have been useful, in fact, to ask McConnell to look at Hiram Smalls’s body, but now the doctor was here; still, work might be the best thing for him. If there was any possibility of foul play, Lenox might ask him to return.

  Sandy Smith turned out to be a small, dark-haired, and precise-looking man, a contrast to the vast Crook. He wore glasses, a short-brimmed hat, and a snug gray waistcoat, and constantly checked a gold pocket watch that sat in a small pocket therein. He shook Lenox’s hand enthusiastically and repeated several times that he thought their chances were better than anyone realized, which was cheering to hear.

  Soon enough they arrived at a small, square park, full of bright green grass and low, well-maintained trees.

  “This is Sawyer Park,” said Smith. He gestured to the arcades that ringed it. “Many of our finest shops are here—there you see my law office—and the apartments above the arcades are very eligible indeed. Mr. Roodle’s agent has that shop, the milliner’s.”

  “I don’t see much of a crowd.”

  Smith looked at his watch. “We have twenty minutes yet. Nobody wants to close shop or leave work much before they have to, but there’ll be a hundred people here, give or take. How many have you been speaking to generally?”

  “Yesterday? Only twenty or thirty at a time. More like meetings than speeches.”

  “Well, I hope you’re in good voice.”

  “I think I am. The issues shall carry us, I expect.”

  “Well,” said Smith doubtfully, “people around here are fond of a good speech.”

  “Shall I take questions?”

  He laughed. “Yes, whether you like to or not.”

  “I see.”

  Smith and Lenox spent the next few minutes shaking hands with people who happened to pass by. Some of these stayed in the park, others left and then returned with a friend, and soon there was a sizable crowd amassed on the small green, even larger than a hundred people. Lenox felt nervous, but he had practiced on the smaller crowds and knew he could deliver his speech. His anxiety now went toward the questions, which might well be rude or mocking. I must remember to maintain my own manner, he thought; there’s nothing I can do about anybody else’s.

  At last he went to the small raised platform that served as a kind of Speakers’ Corner and delivered his speech. It went off fairly well, drawing appreciative laughter and confirming hisses at the right moments.

  Then came the questions.

  The first was already dangerous. “Why would you care about Stirrington?” a man a few feet off to the side asked.

  “Because there’s an election here!” somebody farther back shouted, and everyone laughed.

  “It’s true that I’m here because of this by-election,” Lenox said when the noise had died down, “but I’m here because I care about every corner of England and all her people, and Stirrington is just as much a part of this country as Sussex, where I’m from, or London, where I live. People here, like people anywhere, want a decent wage, a strong government, and”—here Lenox gulped back his pride—“a fair price for beer.”

  This answer earned Lenox a round of applause.

  “What’s a fair price?”

  “Less than you’re paying,” the candidate answered.

  “Do you drink?”

  “Not right now, thanks.”

  Another laugh, and Lenox felt he was getting the hang of the questions. A little humor mixed with broad answers.

  Then a short, fat, sharp-faced man s
tanding not five feet away said, loudly enough for everyone to hear, “You should go back to London, Mr. Lenox.”

  Smith’s voice behind Lenox whispered, “That’s Roodle.”

  “I will when I’m elected, Mr. Roodle, so I can represent this wonderful town.”

  In the crowd there was total silence, almost an anticipatory inhale of breath, as the two candidates faced each other for the first time.

  “So you can prance around in Parliament and forget all about us back here.”

  “No man who knows me could deny that all of my convictions, all of my beliefs, are directed toward the protection of people like these. A better life for people here in Stirrington, and everywhere across England. I’ll never forget that.”

  “You don’t know ‘these people,’ ” he said with a scoffing laugh. “I’ve been here my whole life, sir.”

  Lenox felt a riposte forming somewhere in his brain. “Your whole life?” he said.

  “My whole life,” confirmed Roodle.

  “Yet your brewery hasn’t.”

  There was a moment of silence, followed by an absolute roar of laughter. When it subsided just a little, Smith said, “Thank you!” and pulled the candidate offstage.

  The small man was thrilled. “Leave ’em on a high note,” he said. “That was wonderful! You showed Roodle! Round one to Lenox! Come, come, we must wade into the crowd and shake every hand we can find! Come! ‘Yet your brewery hasn’t,’ he says! Wonderful!”

  CHAPTER TEN

  F

  lushed with success, Lenox spent an hour in Sawyer Park, until he had indeed shaken every hand he could find. Smith was invaluable—had grown up in Stirrington and seemed to know every soul who lived within the town limits and a good many that lived beyond. On Roodle’s behalf several beefy-looking gentlemen were circulating in the park, saying that glib talk would get them nowhere, that the beer tax would probably be lowered regardless of this election’s outcome, and most importantly that Lenox was an interloper and a fraud—but all to little avail. Lenox was the man of the hour, and people of every stripe crowded around him, congratulating him and asking him questions (often very personal ones—one young man asked what Parliament could do about getting him onto the county cricket team, which Lenox still wasn’t sure had been a joke).

  Finally Smith and Lenox had met everyone there was to meet, and Lenox, who after the headiness of the speech remembered again that Hiram Smalls was dead and began speculating in his mind about the Pierce and Carruthers murders, inquired what they were to do next.

  “It’s a fearful proposition, but I thought perhaps we might call on Mrs. Reeve.”

  “Who is that?”

  “Has Crook not told you about her, then? Perhaps we should wait.”

  “Who is she?”

  “Mrs. Reeve is a widow, about fifty. She was married to Joe Reeve, famous in these parts as Durham’s best horse trainer. He left her with a comfortable living, and her house is a kind of stopping point for every woman in town. There’s always food and tea, and people agree to meet there as if it were a shop or a train station. Mrs. Reeve herself is very influential with all of the women I know.”

  “She sounds a fascinating character.”

  “Aye, and a powerful one. Men with little time to waste on politics will often listen to their wives, I believe.”

  “What is she like in person?”

  “Oh—fat—exceedingly fat.”

  “What else?”

  “Well—I don’t think she’s ever properly left Stirrington. It’s possible—and mind, I don’t say probable—that she’s never left town. She may have been to Durham once, but I can’t remember hearing of it.”

  “On the provincial side of things?” Lenox asked, with what he hoped was delicacy.

  Smith laughed. “I didn’t want to say it.” Then he paused. “I’ve been to France, actually.”

  “Mr. Smith, I hope you don’t think I class you in such a way? I really don’t look down on Stirrington, you have my absolute word. Whatever Mr. Roodle says.”

  “No, no, of course,” said the lawyer, red faced. “At any rate—to Mrs. Reeve’s?”

  However, Mrs. Reeve was—and Mr. Smith called it an aberration—away from home. According to her housekeeper, who looked flustered, Mrs. Reeve was at her doctor’s.

  “And if people would stop visiting until she returned I wouldn’t complain,” she added. Then rushed to say, “Not meaning you, Mr. Smith.”

  It was just past four o’clock by then. “I hate to waste any daylight,” said Smith, “but perhaps we should visit Mrs. Reeve after supper?”

  “Will she be up that late?”

  “She keeps very late hours—requires next to no sleep, apparently.”

  “She does sound a peculiar woman,” Lenox said.

  “Well—quite.”

  Back at the Queen’s Arms, Lenox found Crook serving pints of ale to the first men who were getting off work. He had already heard all about the speech and congratulated Lenox on the success of his conversation with Roodle.

  “Dirty trick,” the bartender added, “but we’ll see him done for.”

  “I hope so, anyway.”

  “If he wants a fight, he’ll have a fight.”

  “I’ve never asked you, Mr. Crook: Why do you involve yourself in politics? Is it of special interest to you?”

  “I’ve always thought a man ought to believe in something, Mr. Lenox, and if he believes in something he ought to support it. Good evening, Mr. Pyle. A pint of mild, I expect?”

  With that Crook was at the other end of the bar.

  “Perhaps we could see Mrs. Reeve tomorrow, Mr. Smith? I don’t feel my most vigorous.”

  “Of course,” said Sandy, although he looked chagrined.

  Lenox didn’t care a fig at the moment, however, and bade farewell to his companion even as he began to walk tiredly up the stairs to his room.

  “Wait, sir!” said the voice of Lucy, the waitress, behind him. “Here’s your telegram!”

  With some excitement Lenox took it from her, enfolding a few pennies’ tip in her hand.

  It was from Dallington, sent in at Claridge’s Hotel. Lenox knew this was one of Dallington’s watering holes and hoped the young man wasn’t reverting, as he occasionally had even under Lenox’s tutelage, to his old, dissipated ways. Still, the telegram was coherent.

  GLAD YOU ARE INTERESTED IN THE CASE STOP LONDON TEDIOUS AT THE MOMENT STOP SMALLS FOUND HANGING BY BOOTLACES FROM WALL HOOK IN HIS CELL STOP APPARENT SUICIDE STOP EXETER CONVINCED MURDER STOP VERY FEW DETAILS RELEASED BUT SPOKE TO WARDEN TODAY STOP SMALLS LEFT BEHIND SEVERAL TORN BITS OF PAPER AND ON TOP OF THEM THE FAMOUS ORANGES STOP GOOD LUCK THERE STOP DALLINGTON

  As Lenox was reading, McConnell knocked at the door and came in, looking fresher after his day’s rest but troubled nevertheless.

  “Read this,” said the detective.

  “Interesting,” said McConnell when he was finished. He handed it back. “What do you make of it?”

  “Well—I wonder whether it was murder. If Exeter believes something, I always examine the opposite possibility.”

  “Suicide?”

  “Doesn’t it seem more likely than murder? Why murder Smalls if you were his partner? Wouldn’t it draw attention to you?”

  “Of course,” said McConnell. “Hence the appearance of suicide.”

  Lenox sighed. “You’re right, of course, and it’s easy enough to enter a prison if you wish to—those guards will look away for a price, no matter what you do. Only it seems so transparent. Still, there was always the risk of Smalls ratting out whomever he worked with.”

  “Yes.”

  “I wish I knew what ‘several torn bits of paper’ meant, exactly.” Lenox paused. “McConnell, how are you feeling?”

  The doctor shrugged. “Well enough physically, I suppose. Full of regret as well.”

  “I know you came all this way, but how about some work?”

  To Lenox’s surprise, McConnell fairly l
eapt at the idea. “I would like that beyond anything.”

  “It would be back in London.”

  “About Smalls?”

  “Yes—and to see if you could find any information others missed about Pierce and Carruthers, too.”

  McConnell laughed. “I haven’t been here twenty-four hours,” he said.

  In part Lenox was hoping a trip to London would force McConnell to see Toto, but he didn’t say that. “Still, I’m glad you came,” he said. “I felt terrible having to leave at the moment of your loss.”

  “Does this mean you’re looking into the Fleet Street murders?”

  “I suppose I shouldn’t. I shall have to stay here.”

  “Yes,” said McConnell. “This is important.”

  “Please let me know of your progress, however.”

  “By telegram, yes.”

  The two men, each unhappy in his own way—Lenox to be out of London and because of Lady Jane’s worries, McConnell for more profound and sorrowful reasons—sat for another moment and spoke. Then McConnell stood up and said he’d better pack.

  Lenox rang for Graham then. He hadn’t seen his valet since that morning.

  “Graham,” he said when the man appeared in the doorway, “take a look at this.” He passed over Dallington’s telegram.

  “Yes, sir?” said Graham when he had finished reading it.

  “Well? What do you make of it?”

  “Are you inclined to believe it was murder, sir, as Inspector Exeter does?”

  Lenox again expressed his ambivalence on the question.

  “With so few facts, I suppose there’s little to speculate about, sir.”