The Mutilated Merchant (The Edrin Loft Mysteries Book 1)

by Jon Evans

  The story they settled on was that there'd been an attempted robbery at a bank in another city. Their fictional criminals had escaped, and Commander Cadogan had given them orders to notify the banks of Kalider here to be on the look out for the culprits. They spiced the story up with the addition of six armed men had burst into the bank and injured several staff and customers in an attempt to rob it.

  Fortunately, they'd got away with very little, but the city was in an uproar. As the gang got away, the fear was that they might very well come to Kalider to try the same thing. It was only the fast thinking of the Watch that had prompted them to send a message to neighbouring cities immediately to warn them. If that didn't do the trick, Loft couldn't imagine what would.

  "Good morning, we're here to see the manager," Loft said to the nearest guard when they reached the top of the steps. He was blond, and his colleague had light brown hair, both were a head taller than Loft and didn't fit the description in the slightest. They completely ignored him, eyes fixed on the street.

  "Excuse me, officer," said a polite and much smaller man stood directly in front of the doors. He was wearing an entirely different type of uniform, a buttoned coat, no armour and a tall hat.

  "The guards aren't to speak to bank customers or guests, so they can concentrate on protecting the bank. My name is Jelling, and I'm the doorman. If you'd like to step inside and speak to someone at the reception podium, they'll be able to help you out," he said politely as he grasped the door handle, opening it wide and waving Loft and Gurnt inside.

  "Thank you, Jelling," Loft said as they went inside.

  The room they entered was a large, open hall with ceilings several stories high. Counters wrapped around the walls to the left, right and in front of them. Cashiers were sat behind a shield of ironwork atop the counters, some serving customers and some carrying out paperwork or counting money.

  At first glance it the ironwork was elaborate and decorative, tipped with gold. A more thoughtful look revealed that it was sturdy and the tops ended in sharp looking points, it wasn't just for show. Climbing over that would be a delicate exercise if you could do it at all.

  Behind the counters, there were doors to offices which seemed to line every wall. There were two levels of balconies, wrapping around the building above the cashier's counters. There were more offices on those levels too.

  Loft spared a glance up and over his shoulder and could see that the offices extended around the side of the building above them as well, clearly going over the columned frontage of the building.

  There were stairs on the left and right walls, outside the counters but guarded, and spiral staircases in the opposite corners behind the counters. There was a guard by each of those, even though it was behind the security ironwork. A few guards paced about the bank as well, walking along the balconies or around the ground floor.

  In front of them, as Jelling had said, was a raised podium, with space for half a dozen staff, marked clearly as the reception. It was just high enough to give them a clear view of everyone on the ground floor of the bank. He approached with Gurnt, and one of the staff smiled politely at him.

  "How may we help you today, Captain Loft," the man asked.

  That was a surprise. His uniform and armour did carry the insignia of the Old Gate Watch House and, of course, showed his rank but most civilians couldn't identify the rank insignia. His name wasn't on his uniform either. He wondered how this man knew his name at all, Loft didn't recognise him.

  "We need to have a quiet word with the manager, it's quite urgent," Loft said.

  "May I ask what the issue is, Captain? It's not often that we get officers of the watch in the bank. If you just wish to open an account for yourself or perhaps for your Watch House, I can have one of our senior cashiers take care of that for you?" the man replied.

  Loft leaned in close, and the man leaned down as far as he could in response, then he whispered, "It's regarding a security matter, a potential risk to the bank."

  The receptionist raised an eyebrow, "Then perhaps our head of security would be the best person to speak to? He's in his office if you'd like to see him?"

  Gurnt moved forward and whispered, "Look, we're trying to be discrete here, but the information we have has to go to the manager directly. It concerns another bank having troubles, and their guards were involved. Doubt there's a problem here in the capital, but it would be bloody embarrassing if there were a little problem and we'd gone and told the culprit directly, wouldn't it?"

  The receptionist blanched at that, and his eyes glanced suspiciously at some of the guards around the room, "That wouldn't be a little problem, it would be a bloody disaster!" he hissed frantically. His eyes flicked suspiciously around the room, from guard to guard.

  The banker took a deep breath and composed himself, smiled and said a little more loudly, "If you'll just wait here a moment I'll go and get you an immediate meeting with the manager so you can discuss this new account, privately. My apologies for the delay I was just trying to be helpful, but I quite understand your point. If you'd just like to wait at the benches by the staircase over here, I'll be right back."

  He stepped down from behind the podium and lead them to the corner to the right of the entrance. There were several comfortably padded bench seats arranged around a table near one of the wide staircases.

  There was a decanter of water, and some glasses so they helped themselves while they waited for him. It didn't take long, he reappeared quickly, moving with an awkward hustle as he tried to balance speed with decorum and discretion.

  When he reached them, he said in a clear voice, "Captain, Sergeant, if you'd like to join me, Mrs Earligh would be happy to speak to you about the Watch Widows and Orphans fund account. My apologies for the delay, a small error with the appointments on my part."

  "Oh that's not a problem at all, so kind of you to sort it out, we would have been happy to come back another time," Loft said.

  They followed him upstairs and then along the balcony which ran along the front wall. They were shown through two large double doors into a long, thin outer office which housed a lot of filing cabinets and several secretarial staff.

  It was an unusual room, though narrow it was double height, and there was a balcony above them which housed what was effectively a library that ran around the entire room.

  There were more double doors in front of them, labelled Office of the Bank President, but also a pair above on the balcony which suggested the books, or more likely, ledgers, could be accessed from a similar balcony in the manager's office as well.

  The receptionist opened the doors and introduced them as they entered, "Captain Loft and Sergeant Gurnt from the Thie…. The Old Gate Watch House," he announced, narrowly avoiding their vulgarian epithet.

  Loft found it even more interesting that he knew Gurnt's name, although it was entirely possible she had a certain notoriety given her behaviour in City Hall. It occurred to him that he might need to check some of her records more thoroughly to see if there were a lot of incidents like that.

  The receptionist backed out of the room, shutting the doors behind him as the manager spoke, "Good morning officers. What may the Bank of Drake and Coyne do for you today? I was told that there was some kind of security issue that you were reluctant to discuss with our guards?"

  Mrs Earligh was a dapper looking, somewhat elderly lady dressed rather like a neatly turned out grandmother. Loft glanced around the room and saw a few portraits which strongly suggested that was because she really was a smartly dressed grandmother.

  "Please, do take a seat," she said, gesturing to the two chairs in front of her desk. Their legs folded under them politely and Loft wondered if he was the only one who was having flashbacks to childhood.

  She had a friendly face and a broad smile, but her eyes held a steely glint that reminded him of one or two of his elderly relatives and the dim view they took of little boys who pinched biscuits. He'd be willing to bet she was the picture of charm if y
ou were polite, and the embodiment of icy venom if you gave her cause.

  "In a sense, that's correct Mrs Earligh. There is potentially a problem with your security but not for the reason that we gave your receptionist, I'm afraid. Regardless of that little white lie, we urgently need to discuss this matter with you, and while the bank isn't likely at risk it is a highly sensitive matter," Loft said.

  "But you don't have a reason to think we're about to be robbed by our own guards?" she said.

  "Not specifically although once we explain this I suspect you may want to look into an audit," Loft said.

  "Well, I'm intrigued, Captain Loft. Do go on but if you don't mind, I'm running a well-oiled machine here, and so if you can possibly cut to the chase, please do so. I'm an aficionado of brevity. Don't worry about offending me, I'm not a self-important Councillor or an overly sensitive Vice Chancellor," she smiled sweetly.

  Loft practically choked at that. How in the name of the seven fundamentals of science did she know about either of those incidents? It surely couldn't be public knowledge yet, there hadn't even been time for any of the newspapers to pick up the stories.

  "Certainly, madam," he said.

  "Oh, please don't call me that. Mary or Mrs Earligh is absolutely fine. Madam makes me sound like a grandmother, and I have a picture of my grandchildren behind my desk that's taller than those little monsters are, so I don't need reminding of it," she said with a note of distaste. Yes, just like some of his elderly relatives, Loft thought with a fond smile.

  "My apologies, Mary. We are investigating the murder of a spice merchant by the name of Anar Perl. I'll spare you the details but suffice to say it was a particularly violent murder. An attempt was made to make it appear that a public figure was involved in or present during the crime. Witnesses saw an item taken from this figure, that we later found at the scene of the murder, describe a man of average height and features with black hair,"

  "I'm with you so far, Captain," she replied.

  He stood and reached out his hand across her desk, opening it to reveal the broken clasp, "They also said he was wearing a green cloak, with gold stitching and clasped with a snake. We found this clasp when we searched the murder scene," he explained.

  She adjusted the spectacles on her nose and peered at the clasp, "It looks very much as if one of our guards was involved then, doesn't it? The cloak sounds like the ones that we use exclusively for our guards, and that clasp is definitely one of ours. I can tell you, Captain, that those cloaks are an unnecessary expense made of fine material and issued only to our guards. The clasps are much cheaper because they're only thinly plated. It's easier to just replace them regularly, and we maintain the cloaks well, " Mrs Earligh said.

  "They were my father's idea, Mr Coyne. He wanted our guards to look the part, but he was also most insistent that a guard couldn't be expected to do a good job if he was either baking in the summer or freezing and soaked in the winter. There's a whole history to it but suffice to say there are different cloaks for different seasons, and we keep the costs down by re-using them when guards leave and making sure they're properly cleaned and repaired. We have a good stock of clasps as well, can you guess why they break so easily?"

  Loft shrugged, "I've no idea." For a woman who favoured brevity, she was certainly giving him a lot of information about the cloaks. If only all the people they spoke to would be this helpful, he thought.

  "Because if you snag your cloak while chasing a robber, you don't want it to choke you. Better it breaks if you're rough with it than get it caught and get throttled or they grab you and strangle you with it," Gurnt piped up.

  "Top marks, Sergeant. My father was in the army you see, and their regimental cloaks were pinned to their armour, so there was nothing to wrap around the throat if you fell off your horse. He was a very meticulous man, my father," Mrs Earligh beamed at them.

  Well, that explained the need for the whole anecdote then, pride in her father and the chance to tell a family story. It wasn't lost on Loft that it also presented the bank as a place that cared for its staff.

  "I don't suppose you found a cloak to go with this, did you?" she asked.

  "No, I'm afraid not. Why?" Loft asked.

  "They're numbered when they're issued so if one had gone missing a guard would have had to requisition a new one and make up a story. They don't have to explain a broken clasp, they just take one out of the box and could sew it on again themselves if they're so inclined," she said, "Never mind. I'm sure you weren't expecting your investigation to be that easy."

  "It hasn't been so far, but we seem to be making progress," Loft said.

  "We have a lot of guards because they work shifts and I don't know them all personally. There must be at least one with black hair, but it is not our head of security I can assure you unless he was wearing a wig. Shall I have him come up so he can tell us which of his guards you should speak to?" Mrs Earligh asked.

  "Yes, please, Mary. I would rather be as discrete as possible. We don't yet know if the person described is one of your guards, if it was a disguise someone wore or if they're the killer or an accomplice," he explained. "If it is someone who works in your bank, I would rather they not realise we're here looking for them."

  "Of course," Mrs Earligh said. She wrote a note on a small pad on her desk, rolled it up and slid it into a small tube. Flipping open a lid on a side table by her chair, she popped the tube in, resealed it and then pulled a short lever. There was an implosive popping sound and the faint ding of a bell on the other side of the door.

  Loft was itching to look at the mechanism. A way to pass a message around the building it seemed? The engineer who had designed that could be making a fortune if all the banks bought it. He wondered if they could ever have something like that for the Watch, sending a message between houses to summon help or transfer a prisoner would be extremely helpful.

  A few minutes later a secretary knocked, entered the office and approached the desk. She whispered something to Mrs Earligh and presented her with a thick, red book. "Thank you, Glynnis," Mrs Earligh said.

  The secretary bustled out, and Mrs Earligh said, "My security man will be in the antechamber presently. This," she said opening the books, "Is the accounts ledger for one Mr Anar Perl."

  "He banked here?" Gurnt asked.

  "I asked them to check in case he did, and it seems that is the case. The account isn't one I'm familiar with because it's too small for me to be directly involved in," Mrs Earligh said as she leafed through it. She found the last few pages and ran her finger down them.

  Loft waited patiently while she looked at the account. He didn't expect it to show anything useful, but they hadn't found a large chest of money at either building they'd searched, just the money in the till. Whatever he'd done with his funds from the arms trade, it hadn't been stored in the shop, or else it had been stolen by the killer.

  A few minutes later the bank manager looked up. "Now, I'm taking you at your word that the customer is deceased, Captain Loft. I take it there's no doubt about his identity? You did say it was a very violent crime," she asked.

  "No, we're confident it's him," he said.

  "Very well. I'm not sure if you're familiar with the finer legal points, but I can't relinquish these accounts to you until his estate's lawyers have carried out the legal niceties. I can, however, give you their details as someone would need to inform them of their client's death so they can deal with probate," Mrs Earligh wrote a quick note with a name and address on it and passed it over.

  "Once they're happy, or if you can get a Magistrate's Warrant, I can let you come in and look through the book or make a copy of it. We have to keep the original for our records obviously. In the meantime, I can tell you there's nothing suspect in here. There's not an inordinate amount of money going in and out, it doesn't have any huge deposits or withdrawals. It looks like every well run, reasonably profitable, small business that we deal with. I don't think it's going to help you if you are looking for evid
ence of criminality on the part of the deceased," Mrs Earligh said.

  "Our immediate concern is to solve the murder itself, but the motive behind it is important to us. We have reason to believe that he was involved in smuggling, so we will be back for the accounts when we've got the necessary authorisation for it," Loft said.

  "Good. I'm sorry to have to delay handing this information over, but even if he has no wife and children, his lawyers of his estate might sue if we handed over the records. Our contracts with account holders clearly guarantee their privacy, even in death," Mrs Earligh said, "It might be worth speaking to them though, they might be amenable to giving you access without a warrant, given the unusual circumstances."

  "Is that the only account he holds with you? There aren't any goods with you for safe keeping or accounts for other businesses?" Gurnt asked.

  "Not unless a grave filing error has been made. However, I will request an audit is done in case his name is on any other books, and I'll have our accounts scribes make a copy of the ledger for you. Once you have the authority to retrieve it, you can go through this original and confirm the copy is accurate," Mrs Earligh offered.