Striking Murder

by AJ Wright

  Brennan walked quickly down the long corridor. The room at the end – the one with an ornate smoked-glass window subtly tinctured with reds and greens suggestive of a miniature cathedral – belonged to the chief constable. He knocked and waited, feeling almost like a recalcitrant choirboy about to face the minister.

  ‘Come in!’ snapped a voice from within.

  Captain Bell was seated behind his immaculately polished desk. Once again, Brennan was struck by the fleeting impression of death as he contemplated his superior’s gaunt features. A pallid hue suffused his skin, which appeared to have all the consistency of rather thin vellum, stretched taut over cadaverous cheekbones. His eyes were cast down in the attitude of close reading, his pince-nez perched on the extremity of a hawk’s beak. The man was a living memento mori.

  After a few seconds he looked up. ‘Please accept my apologies, Sergeant.’

  ‘Apologies, sir?’

  ‘For disturbing your Sabbath. Believe me, I wouldn’t have done so if it had been anything less … disturbing.’

  ‘Disturbing, sir?’ He saw the tic in Captain Bell’s cheek at the unintended echo of his words.

  His superior gave a sigh and steepled his hands. ‘Constable Jaggery told you there’s been a murder?’

  ‘Yes, sir, body found in Scholes in the early hours by a priest, but he said he hasn’t been told who the …’

  ‘Indeed he hasn’t. This needs to be handled with discretion.’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘The victim,’ said Captain Bell, with a dramatic sigh, ‘was one of my closest friends.’

  Brennan waited for a name, his deductive powers being somewhat hampered by the unfortunate circumstance of his never having realised the good captain had any close friends.

  Bell shook his head. ‘It was Arthur Morris, Sergeant.’

  Brennan flinched as the implications swarmed round his brain like angry wasps. It couldn’t have been worse. ‘I see.’

  ‘He has, according to Genesis, “returned to dust”.’ Bell paused, weighing his words carefully. ‘He appears to have been stabbed. Apart from the tragedy for his family, you will, of course, realise what this could mean for the whole town?’ His eyes reflected the note of fear in his voice. He picked up a small envelope and handed it across.

  ‘This was found in his inside pocket. Curious, don’t you think?’

  Brennan looked down at the crumpled and stained envelope. It was addressed to A. Morris. Quickly, he took out the filthy scrap of paper that lay inside and read what was written, his frown increasing as he did so.

  The writing was clumsy, spiderish, its scrawl rendered more vile by the soiled quality of the paper. Whoever had written this, thought Brennan, hadn’t sat at a desk armed with crown vellum notepaper and a blotter.

  ‘Any ideas?’

  Brennan gave a shrug. ‘Doesn’t look like a calling card, sir, does it?’

  The snarl forming around Captain Bell’s mouth made him devise a less impertinent observation.

  ‘It’s quite plainly a threat, Sergeant, is it not?’

  Brennan looked down at the writing:

  His hand shal be agenst evryman and evryman’s hand agenst him.

  Strike causes hell – O Lord end suffrin

  Or die

  ‘Sounds familiar,’ he said. ‘The first line at any rate.’

  ‘Genesis. I think the sentiment is self-evident.’

  ‘Have you any idea what he was doing in Scholes, sir?’

  ‘A complete mystery. Smacks somewhat of Daniel in the lions’ den, does it not?’

  It did indeed.

  The miners’ strike was now in its fifth month, and feelings around the town were running higher than ever since the rumour that Morris and his fellow colliery owners had threatened to bring in blackleg workers from south Wales. The last time that had happened, twenty or so years ago, pitched battles were fought in Standishgate between strikers, police, blacklegs and even the militia sent from Preston. It had been enough to ensure the newcomers were prevented from taking up their work, and the miners had declared it a historic victory.

  A subsequent gloom had settled on the town and its inhabitants like a pall, soup kitchens a common feature now of life in the borough. The sprawling area of Scholes on the edge of town was home to many colliers who would have welcomed the opportunity to impress upon Arthur Morris – literally – how they felt with the help of their size ten clogs. It was chiefly his intransigence that had brought about the strike in the first place – as the owner of the largest collieries in the whole of Lancashire, he was the most vociferous and influential supporter of the coal owners’ insistence in imposing a national twenty-five per cent reduction in the miners’ wages in an attempt to reduce costs. Now, the spectre of starvation haunted almost every home in the borough and throughout the coalfields of the North and Midlands.

  ‘This morning,’ continued Captain Bell, ‘Arthur Morris was reported missing by his son, Andrew. By all accounts his father dined at home last night, then received a mysterious letter …’ He threw a nod at the paper on the desk. ‘And left immediately despite the bitterly cold weather. That was the sum of what he had to tell us.’

  Brennan frowned. ‘Perhaps he was transported to Scholes.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Well, sir, if he were dispatched elsewhere, then conveyed to the alleyway …’

  Captain Bell leant forward. ‘“Transported”? “Dispatched”? “Conveyed”? You speak as if the man was a parcel!’

  ‘Sir.’ Brennan lowered his head respectfully.

  ‘Besides, according to the preliminary report I have here, it was evident the brutal assault took place where he was found. A single stab wound, the man’s life blood splattered around the walls of that … loathsome place. His innards molested by vermin, for God’s sake!’

  He broke off, allowing the blasphemy, the silence and the venom in his eyes to conjure up what he thought of the Scholes district. ‘Knowing Arthur Morris, he would never shirk a challenge. If someone sent him that note he would never rest until he hunted the man down like a wild animal.’

  Brennan examined the letter and the crumpled envelope more closely. ‘There’s no address, sir.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘There’s no address on the envelope, for one thing. Just the name – A. Morris. So I presume it was delivered by hand.’

  ‘Is that relevant?’

  Brennan shrugged. ‘Possibly. But neither is there an address on the letter itself.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘It’s curious, that’s all. If Morris was in Scholes as a result of this letter, how did he know where to go?’

  ‘The letter may have nothing whatsoever to do with his presence in that godforsaken place.’

  ‘But he left immediately after receiving the letter. It’s a fair assumption.’ He read the letter’s contents once more. ‘And perhaps there is an address of sorts here.’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘The second line, sir. “Strike causes hell – O Lord end suffrin”.’

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘It makes a veiled reference to Scholes.’

  ‘Does it? I fail to see …’

  ‘That’s because you are failing to see, in the true sense.’ He spoke quickly, to remove any hint of accusation. ‘If you were looking at the words, it would, of course, strike you at once. The initial letter of each word, sir. They spell out Scholes.’

  With a flourish, Captain Bell grabbed the paper and looked at the words once more. Then he glanced at his detective sergeant with an expression of pique and admiration. ‘It could be coincidence, you understand, Sergeant?’

  ‘It could indeed, sir. But if, as you say, this letter was delivered last night, prompting Mr Morris to leave hastily, then it’s highly probable he saw it as some sort of message, or threat from Scholes. It may be that he recognised the handwriting.’

  ‘Hardly likely, Sergeant. Scrawl like this …’ he slapped the paper as if crushin
g lice. ‘Nevertheless, it was well spotted. Well spotted.’

  He placed the letter on his desk and smoothed it out with his left hand for a few seconds before speaking once more, this time in a low voice. ‘And now you have a painful duty before you, Sergeant. You need to call upon his widow and break the news to her.’

  ‘She hasn’t been told?’

  Captain Bell visibly blanched at the implied rebuke. ‘The man was found in the early hours by a priest. It was naturally assumed the victim was from the area.’

  And therefore the process of identification would have followed at a funereal pace, Brennan thought. Death, too, has its social hierarchy.

  ‘After the report of him missing, our desk sergeant, showing an uncharacteristic talent for arithmetic, put two and two together, recalled the remains of the victim lying in the infirmary morgue, and for once got four. He saw fit to send for me. I myself had the unenviable task of viewing the remains. Gruesome, ghastly business that was.’ He shook his head. ‘Although as for formal identification, that melancholy duty must fall on a member of the family.’

  Brennan stroked his moustache and grunted.

  ‘Yes, Sergeant, what is it?’

  ‘The words may give us the district, sir, but they make no reference to a particular address, not even a name. How would he know where exactly to go? I wonder who he went there to meet – or to confront?’

  Captain Bell, who had clearly grown weary of his sergeant’s musings, could barely conceal his impatience. ‘That is for you to discover, Sergeant. Or do you wish me to do all the work of the detective branch while you stay here and enjoy a steaming hot mug of tea?’

  He heard her coming. When the back door opened, Tommy was standing by the table, his small chest thrust forward proudly.

  Bridie Haggerty closed the door softly behind her.

  She was in her mid-thirties, and had once been comely, her jet-black hair the envy of many, yet the careworn expression she always seemed to bear these days, and the wisps of a premature grey in her hair, aged her ten years. Thin lines stretched from the corners of her eyes, and her cheeks were sunken, seeming to depress even further the downward turn of her narrow lips. She removed her shawl and the long coat she wore, hung them with a slow deliberation behind the door, and placed her head against the rotting door frame, alarming her young son.

  ‘Mam?’

  Bridie turned round and gave him a weak smile.

  ‘What d’you reckon, Mam?’

  He nodded to the table. She moved slowly towards him, placing a hand on the table top to steady herself. For a few seconds, she stared at the dead pigeons, a joyless and stony expression on her face, before reaching down to pull him to her.

  ‘Ee, love,’ she said with a long, slow sigh. Her fingers were cold and damp against his skull.

  He could feel her heart beating fast – thump-thump, thump-thump. She must be more grateful for the birds than even he’d expected.

  ‘Mam. You’re hurtin’.’

  Her arm was forcing his head against her breastbone, making him feel dizzy. When she let go, he looked up at her, and saw the tears streaming down her cheeks. ‘There’s enough for all three of us,’ he said proudly. ‘That’s why I wouldn’t come ’ome till I got three. One each, eh, Mam? What’ll our Molly say, eh?’

  He’d heard mothers, and women in general, cried when they were happy. Perhaps his sister would cry too when she saw the booty he’d brought home. It was a man’s job, to provide for his womenfolk, and he was the only man in the house now.

  ‘Aye, lad,’ she sniffed. ‘You’ve done us proud.’

  Tommy smiled as she reached out and gently stroked his ruddy cheeks.

  Two miles to the north of Wigan, on the edge of the small village of Standish, Arthur Morris’s house lay in its own grounds overlooking – some would say overseeing – the valley where the Morris Colliery had been, until recently, the most productive pit in Wigan.

  Only weeks before the dispute began, a huge block of cannel coal from the colliery had been transported across the Atlantic to become one of Great Britain’s star attractions at the Chicago World Fair, a source of wonderment to the thousands of visitors to the exhibition, whose fulsome encomiums had caused Arthur Morris’s chest to swell with pride at what his company had produced. In one of the many speeches he made during the exhibition, the Americans failed to grasp his humour when he pointed out that his gigantic exhibit was being shown in Chicago, a place where the burning of coal fires had been prohibited to prevent the white façades of the exhibition palaces being stained with smoke.

  ‘Bit late for the palaces in Wigan!’ he had quipped, thus giving his American audience a quite erroneous impression of the town.

  It had been therefore ironic that the subsequent article in the Wigan Observer, in which his Chicago speeches expounding on the dedication and resilience of his colliers were quoted at length, was followed a week later with a report of another speech, this time to the South Lancashire Coal Owners’ Association calling for the same colliers to ‘share in the bad times as well as the good.’

  Now, that Chicago triumph was a euphoria consigned to history.

  From the extensive gardens that sloped at the rear of the house, one could see plainly in the distance the two giant chimneys that stood at either end of the colliery, tall and indomitable sentinels looming over not only the head frame of the pit but also – and more symbolically – the rows of terraced houses that spread outwards from the outer edges of the pit, like the strands of a spider’s web.

  Strange, thought Brennan as he alighted from the hackney carriage, how fresh the air tastes up here, despite the bitter cold and the fading afternoon light.

  ‘Ten minutes,’ he barked to the cab driver who had brought him from the station, a pasty-faced walrus who scowled his response by blowing into his hands.

  Brennan walked along the snow-crusted drive and came to the front door, where he lifted an enormous knocker curiously shaped like a Davy lamp in heavy brass and slammed it twice against its rest. The loud echo it produced slightly unnerved him, as if its weighty announcement gave rude notice of the tidings he bore. Seconds later, a maid opened the door and gave him a small curtsy as he introduced himself.

  ‘One moment, sir, if you please,’ she said with a second curtsy before closing the door again and disappearing. He could hear firmer, heavier footsteps from beyond the door, which now swung open with a far greater sense of urgency.

  A young man stood on the threshold. He was tall, mid-twenties, Brennan guessed, with dark features and a heavy set of eyebrows. The firm set of his jaw suggested a resoluteness that was tempered somewhat by the mildness in his eyes. ‘I’m Andrew Morris, Sergeant. Have you found my father?’

  The infinitesimal pause before the word ‘found’ imbued his question with a morbid prescience. He half-turned to acknowledge the presence of a tall, elegant woman behind him. Mrs Morris, Brennan presumed. She appeared to be walking with some difficulty, leaning on who he presumed was her personal maid.

  ‘My mother’s half-demented with worry. It’s so unlike him to stay out all night. If he’s been in an accident …’ He let his voice trail off, his eyes registering the sombre but steady gaze that bore down on him. ‘Please, Sergeant Brennan. This way.’

  The young man led the way past his mother, who Brennan noticed was now trembling, her grip on the maid’s shoulder tightening and causing the poor girl to wince. Once they were all ensconced in the small morning room beyond the stairs, Brennan wasted no time, directing his words to the one he deemed strong enough to bear the raw force of their meaning. ‘It is my sad duty to inform you, Mr Morris, that your father has been the victim of a brutal assault …’

  Before he could finish, he heard a muffled cough, then what sounded like a long, mournful sigh. He saw Mrs Morris grip her temples with both hands, every limb appearing to tremble with a growing lack of control.

  ‘Mother!’ Andrew Morris yelled.

  She slumped forward, held
steady by the alertness of her maid, who gently laid her onto a chair beside the door, her head lolling back loosely, like a rag doll torn by a child intent on mischief.

  Molly Haggerty stood beneath the big lamp in Market Place. The yellow glow from the hissing gas cast a dim circle around her, affording light but no warmth. She held herself tight, pulling the flimsy shawl close to her head and burying her hands deep inside her skirt. Several beggars shuffled by, heads bowed, shoulders slumped, as they made their way home, the day producing the same meagre results as the day before, and the day before that. Curses drifted skywards.

  Like some bronchial behemoth, a large double-decker bogie car rattled past, shunted along by the smaller engine in front. It was barely half full, the few passengers on the lower deck giving her no more than a cursory glance. She gave the driver, standing by the throbbing engine whose belly was bursting with fiery hot steam, an envious look.

  ‘Lucky swine!’ she whispered to herself, her teeth chattering.

  The driver swayed from side to side as the tram made its way towards Standishgate, and Molly diverted her gaze to the road beyond.

  Where was he?

  She would recognise that confident, jaunty gait of his anywhere. But he was nowhere to be seen.

  And yet last night … what had she done last night?

  She shivered, casting the memory aside.

  She glanced at the clock above the Legs of Man. Five-thirty. Half an hour late.

  Molly bit her lip, a habitual action whenever she was worried, or nervous. She watched as the tram made a sudden descent, its squat chimney belching steam with a screech that made her jump, before it vanished over the brow of the hill. An agony of indecision swept through her. She needed to see him. To be reassured. A sudden fear swept through her, and she shivered once more.