by Roy Lewis
‘You wanted to talk to me,’ I muttered, anxious to keep our meeting as brief as possible.
Redfern showed his yellowing teeth in a mirthless grimace, and nodded. ‘I thought you might be interested to know that no further proceedings are to be taken with regard to that young jumper … the woman we pulled out of the river the other day. Coroner’s inquest quickly over; no formal identification. The name you provided, Harriet, well, as I guessed it didn’t take us very far.’
‘So she’ll be buried—’
‘At public expense,’ he assured me, as though I had been offering to pay. ‘So you can forget all about that sad affair. All over and done. But now … well, there’s this other one.’
I knew what he was alluding to but affected ignorance. He would have read the record at Bow Street: he would know it was I who had placed the information regarding the dead man in the sewer. He stared gloomily at my raised eyebrows. ‘It seems you’re beginning to make a habit of helping us with our official enquiries.’
‘I’m not certain I know what you are referring to.’
‘I refer to the body found under Kent Street.’
I remained silent, glowering at my coffee.
After a short pause, Redfern went on, ‘I happened to read the report this morning. It mentioned your name as the party who had laid the information. That made me curious. So I thought I would have a word with you, sir. Find out if there is anything else you can tell us about this unidentified corpse.’
‘I explained at Bow Street that a client of mine told me …’
‘So the dead man wasn’t someone you knew personally, then?’ Redfern’s suspicious eyes bored into mine. ‘Like the deceased young lady?’
I had drawn the line at naming Bartle. Giving the body a name could have led to unforeseen complications. I shook my head emphatically. ‘No. I filed an information. I knew nothing more about the unfortunate individual.’
‘Yes….’ Redfern murmured, almost to himself. ‘Beaten to death. But I am curious. How did you come by the knowledge that there was a dead man in the sewer?’
I took a deep, wavering breath. ‘Inspector Redfern, I must be frank with you. I am not in a position to explain how this information came to me. You must realize that mine is a profession which brings me into contact with all levels of society, from aristocrats to vagabonds. Persons from all walks of life come to my chambers. But no matter who these people might be, if they become clients, I am sworn to secrecy in regard to what they tell me. I am able to disclose nothing of what is said, or occurs, between me and a client. It is my sacred duty – recognized by the courts – to disclose nothing. It is like the secrecy of the confessional.’
He eyed me disbelievingly, seeing little of the priest in me. ‘You are telling me that a client of yours merely happened to mention there was a body in the sewer under Kent Street but that’s all you can disclose to me about the matter?’
‘That is so.’
‘Even if the client in question might have been the murderer?’
I raised my jaw loftily, giving my impression of an honest pugilist. ‘Of that I can give you an assurance. My informant did not kill this … unknown person.’
Redfern’s saturnine features were scored with doubt. ‘And you can say no more?’
‘I disclosed the information regarding the whereabouts of the corpse as a matter of public duty,’ I said stiffly. ‘But for me, the matter then ends there.’
‘I see.’ Inspector Redfern was silent for a while but his sharp eyes never left my face and once again I gained the impression he knew I was lying, guessed I was concealing something from him. But we both knew there was nothing he could do about it. At last he sighed. ‘Well, that must be that. But I was drawn to ask you, sir, because my inspection of the corpse leads me to believe he was not of the gentry. Rather, a working man, coarse hands, and yet not a labourer …’
‘So?’ I croaked nervously, my mouth dry.
‘His clothing had been taken, of course. Toshers, I imagine. Mudlarks.’ He eyed me reflectively.
‘I would know nothing of that,’ I lied.
Redfern shook his head mournfully. ‘Well, sir, the fact is just as we have more of our share of jumpers, as you have seen, so we have a considerable number of deaths in the streets from the violent actions of the lower classes. Of course, there are many crimes we are unable to pursue to a conclusion by discovering the perpetrator, though the success rate of our new detective force is, I may perhaps immodestly state, considerable.’ He was silent for a few moments, as though weighing his words carefully. ‘And naturally we must deal in priorities. Instructions often come down from the Commissioner to the effect that we should devote more time to certain cases than to others. But …’ He paused, and his eyes flicked up to mine, giving away nothing. ‘It’s the first time in my experience we’ve been told by our superiors that we should take up no further police time in the investigation of the dead man found in the Kent Street sewer.’ His eyes bored into mine. ‘Now why do you think that should be, Mr James?’
Bentinck.
It had to be. No further investigation. Close down the matter. He had already warned me off this whole business. Now, as a man of considerable influence, he must have dropped a word into the ear of the Commissioner. Only a man of his stature and connections would have been able to derail an investigation in this manner.
‘So,’ Redfern said, when I made no reply, ‘a pauper’s funeral for the girl, an unmarked grave for the man in the sewer.’ He finished his coffee with every sign of doleful enjoyment. Then he stood up, reached for his hat and looked down at me. ‘So, Mr James, your public duty has come to naught.’
Not yet, I thought fiercely. Not yet. Bentinck may have turned off the police but he had not got rid of me. There was still one line of enquiry for me and Ben Gully to follow. One we should perhaps have pursued earlier.
Next afternoon, after I met Ben Gully at the Blue Post the drive to Epsom was a relief. We emerged from the sweaty streets of the metropolis into the open air of the countryside. Neither of us spoke much during the drive, once I’d told him of my conversation with Redfern. He made no comment upon my suggestion that Bentinck had stymied the peelers by putting pressure on the Commissioner. As we drove past the leafy hedgerows and the rolling countryside about Epsom I relaxed somewhat, only to become preoccupied with other matters.
I was under renewed pressure from my creditors. I had lent what little I had to Lester Grenwood, and since then I’d had a bad run at the tables, apart from the money I’d borrowed, and lost, at the Derby. As we rattled along the country lanes I began making a mental list of acquaintances upon whom I might prevail to sign a note or two, in order that the baying wolves might be kept from my door. My grandfather had gone to Leamington for the waters; Lester Grenwood had vanished into the country, leaving his own trail of debts; I had exhausted the possibilities among one or two middle-aged widows of my acquaintance, and some of my tradesmen creditors were threatening to set up camp at my door. Few such people are gentlemen, you see.
There was always Bulstrode, of course, but he was financing the present operation and I had the feeling I would be well advised to keep him in reserve for the time being. But musing over such matters was boring. Finally, I dismissed thoughts of money, looked about me and enjoyed the drive, and considered the matter of our visit to the stables where Joe Bartle had worked, Running Rein had been trained, and from which the colt had been mysteriously abducted.
What was noticeable was that within a few minutes of our arrival at the stables, Cornelius Smith, our erstwhile witness at the Exchequer Court, was sweating.
The conversation with Ben Gully had begun casually enough.
We had arrived at the Epsom stables late in the afternoon and we found Smith, who had appeared for us in the Running Rein débâcle, in the stableyard, standing by while a groom rubbed down a sweating horse. As the animal shivered and steamed and stamped on the cobbled yard and Gully began to talk to Smith, I c
ontented myself with observing the stables, the buckets and paraphernalia scatted about the untidy, straw-strewn area, and wondering about the general air of desuetude about the stables. There were few people about: two young lads desultorily mucking out a stable, a scattering of discontented chickens strutting in one corner, a steaming mound of evil-smelling manure and an arrogant, confident rat preening its whiskers in the sunshine against the far wall. I gave Gully my attention only when he moved away from the usual civilities and told Smith he was continuing the enquiries about the disappearance of Running Rein because the principals in the matter were still not satisfied, and the whole issue might be reopened.
My insouciance seemed to have unsettled Smith somewhat: he had been watching me from the corner of his eye as I stood casually by, but now that Gully had reached the reason for our visit to Epsom, Smith rolled his wall eye and adopted a surly tone.
‘I already done all I could to help, gents. I don’t like them courtrooms, but I came along, didn’t I? I gave my testimony, I was straight with his lordship and there’s nuthin’ more I can say, reelly….’
Gully sighed, a bit theatrically I thought, and rummaged in his ample pockets for some tobacco. He looked about him, then leant his broad shoulder against the stable door. As he lit his pipe he eyed Cornelius Smith silently; Smith avoided his glance and paid closer attention to the sweating animal beside him. I said nothing as Gully puffed at his pipe contentedly for a little while, but never taking his eyes off the stableman. Smith shrugged an uneasy shoulder, barked snappishly at the groom and was clearly ill at ease under Gully’s scrutiny. At last, he glared at Gully and muttered, ‘Wot else is it you want from me, Mr Gully?’
When Gully made no immediate reply Smith shot a nervous glance in my direction. For some reason my presence unsettled him, but I’ve found that to be the case often in the courtroom. It was never just my situation as an advocate: there’s always been something about my pugilistic appearance that has worried men, even though, I am forced to admit, it seems also to have attracted women. Now, I looked at Smith, my glance slowly travelling from the top of his head to his stained boots and he shivered. His bow-legged stance was wary, and after a nervy silence he suddenly swore, snatched the curry comb from the groom, shouldered the youngster aside with a curse and begin to apply himself vigorously to the flanks of the nag standing in the yard.
We watched him in silence for a while, then Gully wrinkled his nose and said, almost casually, ‘Tell me, Smith, these men who took Running Rein that day: you didn’t know them, you say.’
‘Like I said in court, they was strangers,’ Smith muttered hoarsely.
‘Strangers, yes,’ Gully remarked ruminatively. ‘But horse-stealers like them, what’s your general experience?’
‘Dunno what you mean,’ Smith replied carefully.
‘Come on, you’ve been in this business a long time. You must have come across coopers like them before now. Who are these people, in the main?’
‘Horse-stealers, you mean?’ Smith wiped a sleeve across his sweating brow. He leaned one elbow on the flank of the horse, frowned, shrugged his narrow shoulders. ‘A low, unprincipled class of men, if you arsk me, Mr Gully. Horse-coopers like them, they’re usually wandering gypsies, or tinkers.’
‘So you’re saying the men who took Running Rein … they were of that kind?’ Gully persisted.
Cornelius Smith was too fly to be caught out that simply. Warily, he shook his head. ‘No, I can’t say that. Never seen them afore. They didn’t look rough, if you know what I mean. But then, maybe they was rigged up, of course, to look better than they was but though they could have been horse-coopers, I couldn’t have sworn to that.’
I watched him closely. He shot another nervous glance in my direction and I guessed the reason for his reticence: he knew that if I had been allowed to question him closely in court on the matter and had given such evidence it would have raised all kinds of further questions – from me, and from a more suspicious judge on the bench. But by indulging in his own prejudices Baron Alderson had let him off the hook, preferring to attack the Fancy.
Gully drew on his pipe, expelled some satisfied smoke in Smith’s direction. ‘So you certainly saw these men. You said so in court. And from what you say now, well, they wasn’t the swell mob then … nor gypsies, neither.’
Smith scratched his head, non-committedly. ‘I couldn’t really say either way, Mr Gully.’
‘But they could have been Lord George Bentinck’s men, maybe?’ Gully mused.
Smith was not being drawn on that. ‘I don’t know about that,’ he replied swiftly. ‘I wouldn’t know such men if I seed them.’
‘And you did see them. And would know them again, I guess.’ Gully straightened from the stable door, tapped out his pipe and looked piercingly at Smith. ‘I’m sure you’d be able to identify them to me if you was to see them again. Sharp character like you.’
The stableowner shuffled uncomfortably. He knew about Gully: he was well aware of his reputation. He could be a hard man. Facing me, an unknown quantity, in court was one thing. Ben Gully was another.
‘I saw them … spoke to them, of course. But I keep telling you Mr Gully, I didn’t know them … they was strangers,’ he insisted.
Gully shrugged his shoulders unhappily. ‘Pity. But then … speaking broadly, using your experience, let’s get back to general things … What’s the usual practice of these men: these so-called horse-coopers?’
Smith breathed more easily. ‘Well, from what I hear… not that I been involved in such practices, gentlemen … generally they remove a horse from the park or the stable, shut it up close until the hue and cry dies down, then they trim it up to alter its appearance, take it to some market at a distance, up north maybe, and sell it … often at an underprice. They don’t try to run the nag themselves, up country. They’re just after the money, you see.’ Smith hesitated uncertainly, concerned that he might already have said too much. ‘Leastways, that’s what I’m told.’
‘They sell the animal on?’ Gully wondered.
Smith shrugged. ‘Well, yes, so I believe. That’s where their profit lies.’
‘At market, you say. Smithfield?’
Smith shook his head. ‘No, when I say market, I mean they usually stables the animal quietly near the market and then finds a low horse dealer….’
‘Londoners?’
Smith grinned conspiratorially. ‘There’s more than a few in the Old Kent Road, I hear.’
‘And you’re absolutely sure you don’t know these men who took Running Rein?’
‘No, Mr Gully, that’s the honest truth. Look, it’s just like I said in court, in front of Mr James here, with me hand on the Book. These lowlife characters, they just told me they come from Mr Wood to collect the horse, and I took ’em at their word, and….’ His voice died away, and he brushed even more vigorously at the flanks of the sweating horse he held by the bridle.
‘Mmm …’ Gully looked quizzically at his empty pipe as though it held some secrets for him, then slowly placed it in the pocket of his waistcoat. He stood up away from the stable wall and shook his head. ‘Pity. You acted like any innocent man would have done, I suppose. Now if Joe Bartle had been here, maybe he’d have known these horse-coopers. You think so, Smith?’
‘Bartle?’ Smith squeaked. ‘How would he have known them?’
Gully shrugged. ‘Well, ain’t it possible? Joe Bartle was working here at the stables … putting in the hours, looking after Running Rein. Maybe he’d have seen these suspicious characters hanging around.’
‘He didn’t say anything to me about it,’ Smith replied warily. ‘But maybe he could have …’
‘And if he had seen them, would he have reported the matter to you?’
‘I don’t know, Mr Gully.’
‘You’re in charge of the stables, Smith.’
Cornelius Smith paused in his labours, seemed to consider the matter, then nodded his head vigorously. ‘Well, yes, that is right, but y
ou got to understand I didn’t know Joe Bartle very well. Not a very communicative man. Said little for himself. His business was his own. Hadn’t been at the stables long. Mooched around with a face as long as a fiddle, most times….’
‘And he didn’t speak to the men who came for Running Rein?’
Alarm flared in the stableowner’s eyes. I could guess at his thoughts: you don’t catch Cornelius Smith like that. ‘’Course not. I already told you clear. The horse was took during the trial. On the Sunday. Joe Bartle didn’t show up here at the stables after that Wednesday previous …’
‘Ah, yes, I remember.’ Gully walked slowly towards the horse as it stood shivering slightly beside Cornelius Smith. He ran a gnarled hand gently along its flank. The twitching horseflesh steamed gently in the afternoon air. Gully stroked its quivering muscles, appreciatively. ‘Nice animal … I hope you’ll take good care of it, Mr Smith. Better than you did Running Rein.’ Gully smiled coldly at the bow-legged little man. ‘But as to Joe Bartle.
You say he didn’t turn up at the stables after the Wednesday. That’s a couple of days before the trial began.’
He glanced at me. I nodded. ‘Saturday,’ I confirmed.
Ben Gully turned back to the nervous stableman. ‘So, why was that?’
‘Didn’t talk to him,’ Smith said boldly, ‘so how would I know?’
‘When you last saw him … on that Wednesday, perhaps … what was he like? What was his demeanour?’
Cornelius Smith leaned against the horse, both arms along its back as he wrinkled his brow and assumed an air of earnest thought about the matter. ‘Well, he was always silent, kept to himself, like I said, but that day … it was the Wednesday, like you said … well, he seemed worse than usual.’
‘Worse? How do you mean?’
‘Well, you know, it was like something was worrying him. He had a brow like thunder, as they say. Snapped at the grooms. Was in some kind of temper.’
