The Deadly Fire

by Cora Harrison

  ‘And he was with you?’

  ‘It was his idea to hide in the wagon. He thought that the farmer might take him on in the morning. God, my feet hurt.’

  ‘That’s good,’ said Alfie encouragingly. ‘That means that they are beginning to thaw out. Come on, Mutsy, let’s go and see if that other fellow is still there.’

  There was no sign of the farmer when Alfie cautiously approached the wagon. The tarpaulin was still securely tied, just as he had left it. He took a quick look around; there was no one near so he walked all around the wagon, sticking his hand in through the gaps as far as it would reach. He had got to the far side of the wagon when he heard the noise of a breath, quickly sucked in.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ he said in a low voice, still checking that the farmer wasn’t anywhere near. ‘I’m Tom’s cousin. I’ve come to get you. Come and have a piece of hot pie.’

  The boy’s head of tousled curls appeared. He did not seem in such a bad state as Tom, more used to sleeping in frozen conditions if what he told Tom were to be believed.

  ‘What’s your name?’ asked Alfie, giving him a hand down and then quickly retying the tarpaulin string.

  ‘I’m Charlie. Is your dog friendly?’ He didn’t wait for the answer. It was obvious that Mutsy was friendly – his tail was wagging so fast that it seemed to stir the veil of fog that hung over everything. The escaped apprentice bent down and put his arms around Mutsy’s neck and buried his face in the big dog’s comforting fur for a minute before looking up with a grin.

  ‘I like dogs,’ he said as he followed Alfie. ‘I was born on a farm. My mother worked as a servant for the farmer. She was turned off when the Missus said that she had stolen some food. She hadn’t, it wasn’t her, but she was sent away with no references so she couldn’t get another job. We came to London, but we were starving and sleeping rough and in the end my mother had to go into the workhouse. That was when I was young and I don’t remember it all too well. I remember playing with the dogs on the farm, though.’

  ‘Was your master at the brickworks a Mr Lambert?’ asked Alfie, remembering the man who had wanted to buy the school.

  Charlie shook his head. ‘Nah,’ he said. ‘Mr Lambert is the rich gent who wants to knock down the whole of St Giles and build some posh houses there. My master is a brickmaker and he works for Mr Lambert on this job. When the houses on Bloomsbury Street are finished he will probably move on.’

  Charlie yawned and then began to shiver. Tom put his arm around the boy’s shoulders. Alfie looked from one white face to the other and made up his mind.

  ‘You’re welcome to doss down with us for a while,’ he said. ‘Now let’s get home and get you two into the warmth. You look like a couple of ghosts.’

  ‘Hide!’ said Alfie urgently, looking around the cellar fearfully. Jack had gone out to get some coal from the riverside and Sammy was sitting in the back of St Martin’s Church, listening to the choir rehearsing, so he could learn some new Christmas carols. Tom and Charlie had been playing cards and chatting together when Alfie heard the footsteps on the stairs.

  ‘It might be the landlord or the rent collector,’ he whispered to Charlie, pushing the boy into a dark corner and pulling the old armchair in front of him. ‘He’d try to charge us extra if he thinks you might be staying here.’

  It wasn’t the rent collector or landlord, though. It was Sarah. She looked very white.

  ‘They’ve found Mr Elmore’s remains,’ she burst out as soon as she came in.

  Alfie took a moment to swallow the lump in his throat before answering. ‘I knew that he must be dead.’

  ‘Are you coming?’ Sarah was on the verge of tears.

  ‘Where?’ asked Alfie, his voice hoarse.

  ‘They’re carrying the body to St Giles Church this evening. It will be moved to the church at Ludgate Hill tomorrow.’

  ‘I’ll come,’ said Alfie. ‘We’ll pick up Sammy on our way.’

  Sarah’s eyes were on Charlie, but Alfie did not offer to explain. He could easily fill her in as they went.

  ‘You’ll stay here with Charlie,’ he said to Tom, ‘and tell Jack where we’ve gone, won’t you?’

  Tom nodded. He and Alfie were still awkward with each other, but it would wear off. Alfie had questioned him enough to make sure that yes, it was Mary Robinson outside the school that night, and it was Tom who had stolen the leaflets and given them to the woman (and only got a few pence in return), but all that he knew was that he went one way and she went the other.

  Did she return and set fire to the school? wondered Alfie.

  Night was beginning to fall by the time they arrived, after picking up Sammy. There was a coffin on a wagon under the lychgate outside the church. It was a very fine coffin, made from shining, exotic wood – ‘mahogany’ Alfie heard someone say – and it was bound with strips of gold, or perhaps brass. There was no sign of the dead man’s father or brother, the rich goldsmiths of Ludgate Hill, but all around there were about fifty mourning children, pupils of the Ragged School, and many women and men, their clothes in tatters, their faces full of sorrow.

  ‘I’d like to sing a hymn for him,’ said Sammy quietly. ‘Would you ask the vicar, Alfie?’

  Alfie cast a quick glance at the self-satisfied face of the vicar of St Giles. This was the man who had appointed the drunken, violent Thomas Orrack to teach the poverty-stricken children of St Giles at the Ragged School, and who now stood amiably chatting with the disgraced teacher. Did Thomas Orrack, wondered Alfie, feel a hatred for the man who had dismissed him? Did he play any part in the tragic fire at the Ragged School at St Giles? And if he did, was the vicar aware of his actions?

  ‘You go ahead, Sammy,’ he said softly. ‘You don’t need permission. Sing out, now.’

  Obediently, Sammy opened his mouth and the golden notes, each pure and perfect, streamed out:

  ‘Glorious things of thee are spoken . . .’

  As Sammy sang, the poor of St Giles sighed and swayed, and knelt on the muddy cobblestones: the Ashkenazi Jews from Germany and Poland placed the ceremonial cap on their heads and the Catholics from Ireland made the sign of the cross on breast and face and a few passed rosary beads between their grimy, work-worn fingers.

  By his side, Alfie was conscious that Sarah was sobbing, but he did not turn towards her. His whole attention was fixed on two very well-dressed men who had just dismounted from a carriage and walked towards the crowd. One was a very old, ill-looking man, walking with difficulty and holding on to the arm of the other. Both held a snowy-white handkerchief in front of their nostrils in an effort to block the noisome smells of St Giles, and they were so alike that it was obvious that they were father and son.

  Both faces bore a strong resemblance to the man whose charred remains lay within the ornate coffin in front of them. Neither face looked grief-stricken or even appalled, but there was a difference. The old man’s face was blank of expression, pinched and blue around the mouth, and the eyes dull and expressionless. But the younger man’s eyes were bright and restless, looking here and there around the crowd and at the derelict houses of St Giles.

  The service at the lychgate was brief and the vicar of St Giles said a lot about the distinguished visitors from Ludgate Hill, and very little about the man who had given up riches in order to devote his life to the education of the ragged children of St Giles.

  Alfie twisted his cap impatiently in his hands and hardly waited until the coffin was taken into the church before exploding to Sarah.

  ‘A terrible accident! That were no accident. He was murdered, that’s what he was.’

  CHAPTER 12

  MURDER HUNT

  Sarah stopped and looked aghast at Alfie. ‘You can’t believe that. The building just went on fire.’

  ‘Very convenient, wasn’t it?’ sneered Alfie. ‘Very convenient for people like Mary Robinson and everyone else who wanted to get rid of Mr Elmore.’

  ‘Shh, keep your voice down,’ said Sarah as a burly figure brushed pa
st them, cloak pulled up around the face and hat pulled firmly down.

  ‘I suppose you don’t care,’ said Alfie angrily.

  ‘Of course I care!’ Sarah stopped to face him. ‘I knew him long before you. Why should you think that I don’t care? Thinking that he was . . . Thinking that it wasn’t an accident, that’s a different matter.’

  ‘Sorry,’ muttered Alfie. He felt a bit ashamed of himself. It wasn’t fair to take his anger out on Sarah. Looking at her now, he could see how white her face was and how black shadows under her hazel eyes showed that she had slept little the night before. She had had to endure a day’s work until she knew Mr Elmore’s fate. All the time that she was scrubbing floors, scouring pots and pans, carrying heavy buckets and beating carpets she had probably swung between hope and dread – and then finally to hear the terrible truth!

  ‘Come back and have some supper with us, Sarah,’ he said, thinking of her returning alone to the tiny cold, bare bedroom next the scullery of the big house where she worked. ‘We’re going to have a good supper tonight. Jack is going to call in at the butcher in Drury Lane on his way back from the river. We’ve been promised some sausages by him and a bone for Mutsy. Mutsy is doing well today; he caught three huge rats under the wheels of the butcher’s cart today at Smithfield.’

  ‘What were you doing at Smithfield?’ asked Sarah.

  Alfie told her the story of Tom and Mary Robinson and about Charlie, the runaway apprentice from the brickworks. He spoke absentmindedly, though, and Sarah read his thoughts.

  ‘Are you thinking that there might be a connection between Mary Robinson and the fire at the Ragged School?’ she asked.

  ‘What do you think?’

  Sarah thought about it, frowning in concentration. ‘It seems a bit far-fetched,’ she said dubiously after a minute. ‘So what if a few stallholders don’t borrow money from her? Does she really make that much from them?’

  ‘Mr Elmore told me that she is supposed to have a fortune invested in gold,’ said Alfie. ‘He said that he had heard she had fifty thousand pounds in gold. I was wondering today if he had heard that from his brother or his father. They run a gold merchant’s business in Ludgate Hill.’

  ‘Funny that Mr Elmore didn’t work there,’ said Sarah.

  ‘I suppose he didn’t take to the business,’ said Alfie, but something was running through his mind and when they reached the police station at Bow Street he stopped.

  ‘You go on to the cellar, Sarah. I’m going to have a word with Inspector Denham.’

  ‘I’ll come with you,’ said Sarah determinedly and Alfie didn’t argue.

  Inspector Denham was a small man with heavy, bushy eyebrows. He gave Alfie a keen glance.

  ‘What brings you here today, Alfie?’

  ‘Murder.’ Alfie’s answer was terse. He stared unflinchingly at the man across the desk.

  ‘Yes?’ The bushy eyebrows shot up. He eyed Alfie with annoyance.

  Alfie faced him resolutely. Inspector Denham didn’t look well, he thought, but he still had to say what he came to say. Sarah glanced from one to the other.

  ‘So, who’s been murdered? Give us a name.’ Inspector Denham coughed for a few minutes, holding a white linen handkerchief before his mouth and then putting it back in his pocket.

  ‘Mr Elmore, the teacher from the Ragged School in St Giles.’

  The bushy eyebrows knitted. The powerful man stared at the shabbily dressed boy. ‘There was a fire; I heard that. The man was trapped.’

  ‘Murdered.’ Alfie still kept the confident note in his voice. Even Sarah, who knew him well, could detect no note of uncertainty.

  ‘Why do you say that?’ snapped the inspector.

  ‘Lots wanted rid of him,’ said Alfie succinctly.

  ‘Need more evidence than that; plenty of people want to get rid of me, but here I am,’ said the inspector with a hint of grin.

  ‘And if you was to be found dead in your office with the place burned around you, I can assure you that I would investigate your death,’ said Alfie grandly.

  ‘Well, that’s a bargain, then. But I’ll need more evidence before I can investigate the death of Mr Elmore, poor man. You tell me what you know and I’ll tell you if there is a case. Who are these people who wanted him dead?’

  ‘First of all there was Mary Robinson – the woman who lends money to the costermongers at Covent Garden. Do you know about her?’

  The inspector nodded. ‘Yes,’ he said cautiously. ‘That’s my patch, I was aware that something was going on.’

  ‘Charging six hundred per cent. That means that for every hundred pounds she lends, she gets back six hundred.’ Alfie suddenly felt a pang. Without Mr Elmore he would never have heard of percentages, let alone understand how they worked. ‘He was on to her and he was trying to tell all the costermongers in Covent Garden and the stallholders in the other markets about her tricks.’

  ‘Wasting his time.’ Inspector Denham sounded dismissive. ‘What else can these poor people do? They haven’t enough left over by Sunday night to buy their fruit and vegetables on Monday morning. They haven’t a hope of doing without the money lender. Admittedly she’s a particularly greedy lady, but other money lenders have disappeared from the markets, these days.’

  Alfie thought of the box where, penny-by-penny, sixpence-by-sixpence, the week’s rent was kept safe before any money could be spent on extra food or luxuries such as second-hand clothes. There were times when he felt sick and tired of the responsibility, but he now resolved that he would try to be a week ahead in the future. He never wanted to have to rely on someone as ruthless as Mary Robinson for their survival.

  ‘And then there was Thomas Orrack, the fellow that used to teach at the school. Mr Elmore insisted that he be sacked for being drunk and violent.’

  ‘That happened almost a month ago. Why do something now and not then?’

  ‘And then there is Joseph Bishop, the body snatcher,’ said Alfie.

  Inspector Denham’s face darkened. ‘If you can pin it on . . .’ he began and then tightened his lips.

  Sarah shivered. She hated the name of Joseph Bishop.

  Alfie gave a half-nod. ‘Mr Elmore was warning everyone about Joseph Bishop,’ he said in neutral tones.

  ‘Came here a couple of times, but we could do nothing.’ The inspector sounded apologetic. ‘Seemed we could never catch him in the act. He knew too many ways of hiding if there were any policemen around.’

  He brooded for a moment. And then his eyes sharpened. He looked from one to the other.

  ‘Whatever you do,’ he said emphatically, ‘keep away from Joseph Bishop, both of you. No investigating Joseph Bishop; that’s an order. I wouldn’t like to feel responsible for anything happening to either of you. Now off you go, the two of you. I’ll make a few enquiries, I promise you.’

  ‘Get your men to look at the site – there’s a burnt-out oil tin there. Mr Elmore didn’t use oil. There was nothing but a few tallow candles there in the Ragged School.’ Alfie still did not want to mention the clay footprint. He wanted to think about the significance of this. And, of course, if possible, he wanted to be the one to track down the owner of the footprint.

  ‘Useful piece of information,’ said Inspector Denham. He took a shilling from his pocket and placed it on the table. ‘Here’s something towards the rent. You’re managing all right, the four of you, are you?’

  ‘We’re managing all right,’ said Alfie. He gave a slight grimace at the thought that, with Charlie, the gang was probably now five.

  CHAPTER 13

  A CLUE TO THE MURDERER

  ‘You eat well!’ Charlie swallowed his last sausage and sat back. He was terribly thin, thought Alfie as he poked the fire. He would need a lot of feeding up. He looked at the boy dubiously and Charlie looked back at him hopefully.

  ‘I suppose I should be moving along tomorrow morning,’ he said.

  Alfie grinned. ‘Got a good job lined up at the Bank of England?’ he enquired an
d Charlie laughed.

  ‘I’ll be all right,’ he said brightly. ‘I’ll find something.’

  ‘You can stay if you like,’ said Alfie carelessly. ‘We’ll find you something to do. Can you do any tricks?’

  ‘I could teach him,’ said Tom eagerly. ‘We could work up some sort of routine.’

  ‘If you could get me some clay, I could make some marbles and Tom and I could sell them to kids,’ said Charlie. ‘Some of the fellows at the brickworks used to do that as a sideline – no one would miss the clay.’

  ‘How would we get clay?’ asked Alfie. ‘And where would we get the shovel to dig it?

  ‘I can tell you an easy way of stealing some if you don’t mind going out at night. I daren’t go near the place, myself. That foreman would have me clapped in jail as soon as he laid his eyes on me. He kept telling everyone that the last fellow who ran away got two years’ hard labour in the prison. We have to get the clay, though, and then we can sell the marbles for a penny a dozen. It’s easy money, the fellow at the brickworks told me that.’

  Alfie began to feel interested. He had his own reasons for wishing to have some clay. His gaze went thoughtfully to the chunk of hardened clay, still bearing the distinct mark of a boot sole.

  ‘How hot a fire would you need to get something as hard as this?’ he asked, reaching over and handing the lump to Charlie.

  Charlie turned it over admiringly in his hand. ‘This is as hard as you can get it.’

  ‘Could you make it as hot as that in our fire?’

  Charlie shook his head. ‘No, not a big piece like that, but the fire there would be all right for marbles.’

  ‘That’s not what you were thinking, was it, Alfie?’ Sarah’s sharp eyes were fixed on his face.

  ‘No,’ said Alfie. ‘I was thinking about the fire at the Ragged School. You see, I put this clay in that crumbling old timber cupboard by the front door. I reckon that someone put a can of oil into the same cupboard, set fire to it and then sneaked back out. The fire would have burned inside the cupboard for a while . . .’