by M. J. Trow
Batchelor apologized that he had not and, when stripped down to his shirtsleeves, the room became merely unbearable. The pastry was now draped limply over some pie dishes, and some pigeons lay, divested of feathers but still with their heads and feet, waiting to be packed inside. Batchelor liked his food as well as the next man, but had always had a slight antipathy to the mechanics of how it had reached his plate. The pigeons still looked as if, with a little effort, they could hop down from the table and fly away. He turned slightly, so they were no longer in his eyeline.
The cook looked at Batchelor suspiciously and then at the maid. ‘You know Miss Georgy don’t allow followers, young Emma,’ she said.
‘No, Mrs Brownlow,’ Emma breathed, excitedly. ‘He’s come to write a story about us, about how we looked after Mr Dickens so’s he could write all his stories.’
Mrs Brownlow, who had seen more life than Emma, looked at Batchelor even more suspiciously but, to his relief, something of the pressman clearly still clung to him and she nodded. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘I’m still not sure. But Miss Georgy’s got enough on her plate.’ She smiled at Batchelor. ‘Would you like a slice of my parkin, Mr …?’
‘Batchelor. I’m sure it would be delicious. Thank you.’
‘Emma,’ snapped the cook. ‘Put the kettle over the heat and slice a piece of parkin for Mr Batchelor. It’s time the outdoor men were in for their bever anyway. And Miss Georgy’s got a visitor. They’ll be a-wanting something.’ As she spoke, a bell rang over her head. ‘There you are, young Emma. That’s the bell for tea. Put your cap straight and go and see what she wants.’
Batchelor pulled out a notebook from his pocket and licked his stub of pencil. ‘Can I start with you, Mrs Brownlow, while we wait for the others?’
The cook dimpled at him and tucked the lock of hair away for the umpteenth time. ‘Mr Dickens, he loved my cooking,’ she said. ‘He had to watch his digestion; oftentimes things would upset his stomach and he swore by my beef tea then.’
Batchelor leaned so hard on his pencil the tip broke off, and the rest of his notes, when he looked at them later, proved to be all but illegible.
She leaned forward more, leaning her substantial bosom on the table. ‘If he was took really bad, I’d put a drop of my medicine in it for him. I suffer with my tubes something dreadful, you know. A few drops of McMunn’s Elixir soon had him right as rain.’
‘McMunn’s …?’
‘Elixir, yes. A drop of laudanum soothes the stomach, I always say. A good, healthy medicine. I swear by it.’ Her rather piggy eyes suddenly sparkled. ‘Perhaps if you put that in your article, Mr Batchelor, McMunn’s might give me something, do you think? For the advertising?’
‘Who knows?’ Batchelor said, with a thin smile. ‘So, your beef tea; a favourite of his, you say?’
‘Oh, yes. Whenever he was feeling peaky.’
‘And had he been feeling peaky lately?’ Batchelor tried to sound calm.
‘He’d gone off his tea and coffee,’ Mrs Brownlow mused. ‘And he hadn’t eaten anything like his usual amount of eggs and anchovies, nor his Stilton; said it tasted funny.’ She wrinkled her nose. ‘But I says to Emma, I says. Stilton always tastes funny to me, so how can he tell?’ She leaned back and slapped her knee with the joke.
‘I can’t help noticing that you share a name with one of his characters, Mrs Brownlow.’ Batchelor decided to change the subject.
‘Do I?’ The cook was a little nonplussed. ‘Oh, I see what you mean. No, my real name isn’t Brownlow. All the cooks here are called Brownlow, just like the gardeners is all called Cratchit. No, my name’s not Brownlow.’
There was a pause which began to grow awkward. Finally, Batchelor couldn’t stand it any longer. ‘And what is your name, then, Mrs …?’
‘Oh, you can still call me Mrs Brownlow,’ the cook said, smiling comfortably. ‘I’m used to it by now. But my real name, my given name, you might say is Gamp. Catherine Gamp.’
Batchelor couldn’t really think of anything to say after that, so busied himself writing in his notebook.
They both looked up in alarm as Emma burst in, eyes wide and sparkling. ‘Oh, my word,’ she breathed. ‘Miss Georgy has a visitor, a most handsome and amusing American man. Do you think he is here courting, Mrs B, now that Mr Dickens is gone?’
‘Emma!’ The cook looked sharply at Batchelor. ‘Not in front of guests. Does she want tea?’
‘No. She did offer it to Mr Grand,’ she smirked to say the name of the gorgeous stranger, ‘but he said no, he wouldn’t trouble me, thank you.’ She sat down with a bump on one of the kitchen chairs. ‘Ooh, he’s ever so handsome.’
Batchelor couldn’t see it, himself, but he had noticed that his partner had this effect on women. He kept his counsel; after all, he wasn’t supposed to know the man.
There was a tramp of hobnailed boots in the yard and men’s voices raised in greeting. Emma jumped up to set the kettle back on the boil and for a moment or two all was bustle. Two men came in, in their shirtsleeves already; it was clear they knew Mrs Brownlow’s domain of old. They both cast sideways looks at Batchelor.
‘This is Mr Batchelor,’ Emma said, putting the enormous brown teapot down in front of the cook. ‘He’s a writer.’
‘Oh, ar.’ The larger of the two men, the gardener by his fingernails, pulled his cup towards him and poured some of the contents into the saucer. He blew furiously on the surface and slurped it down in one. ‘What sort of thing d’you write about, then? Stories, like the master?’
‘No one writes quite like your master,’ Batchelor gushed. ‘I write stories for magazines.’
‘Ar, like I say,’ the gardener said. ‘Stories for magazines.’
‘What’s your name?’ Batchelor asked. ‘I’d like to put you in the story I’m writing.’
The gardener snorted and sucked down another saucerful of tea. ‘There’s a question. The name’s Brunt, and I’d be glad if you could call me by that, seeing as it’s an old name, well known around these parts. Bob Cratchit, he was gardener here one afore last and Mr Dickens, he was tickled to call us all by that ever since. But Brunt’s the name and I’d be obliged.’
‘Of course, Mr Brunt,’ Batchelor said, jotting it down. ‘Do you like working here, at Gads Hill?’
‘It’s too much work for one,’ the man muttered, round a mouthful of leaden parkin. ‘But it serves. Got a nice little cottage in the grounds. Wife likes it. Good for the little ’uns.’
‘Oh, you have children, Mr Brunt?’ Batchelor was a little surprised. Brunt looked rather old to have a young family.
‘Six, and another ’un on the way,’ the gardener said and shut his mouth like a steel trap. Slurping the rest of his tea, he pushed his chair back and stood to leave. ‘Can’t stop. There’s some more funny business going on in the shrubbery, branches broke and beds trampled. I’ll flush the beggars out, you see if I don’t.’ And with that, he left, his hobnails crunching on the tile floor of the corridor.
In the silence that followed, the groom spoke for the first time. He was a much smaller man than the gardener and rather dapperly dressed. ‘You’ll have to excuse Bob,’ he said. ‘The family is rather a touchy subject.’
‘Yes,’ Emma said, leaning forward and coincidentally putting her hand on the groom’s knee. ‘Mrs Cr … Brunt is a lot younger than he is and is …’
‘Like a rabbit,’ the cook said, shutting her mouth firmly and looking at Batchelor down her nose. ‘No sooner pops out one than another’s on the way. It’s disgusting, the way she goes on.’
‘But, surely,’ Batchelor was anxious to spread the blame. ‘Mr Brunt must have something to do with it?’
The groom looked sly and smiled at the maid. ‘Not really that much, Mr Batchelor. His wife was maid here before Emma, wasn’t she, Em?’ The maid nodded. ‘She got herself into a bit o’ trouble and master persuaded old Bob to marry her. Got him a nice cottage out of it, so he didn’t mind. Then, o’ course, nothing changed. She kept
on getting herself in family way.’ He laughed coarsely and slapped Batchelor on the shoulder. ‘None of ’em looks like old Bob, that’s for sure.’
Batchelor looked around the table. He couldn’t speak for the moment, because he had taken an unwise mouthful of parkin and it had glued his mouth shut. In the silence, the cook came to his rescue.
‘Well, Mr Batchelor, George is right, although I would thank you to keep such talk out of my kitchen, Mr Butler, if you please! They all have a look of … well, let’s say they all have the same father, even if it isn’t old Bob.’ She looked at the others, who nodded. ‘And he did get a cottage out of it.’ More nods.
Emma got up and picked up the teapot. It was clearly a sign that the bever – which Batchelor had realized to his relief was simply a local term for the mid-morning break – was over. The groom blew some glutinous crumbs from his moustache and left, turning to wink at Batchelor and give the slightest inclination of his head. The cook rose out of her seat, like Leviathan from the Deep, and bustled off into the pantry. The maid loaded her arms with plates and cups, leaving herself rather at the mercy of the groom, who pinched her cheek and patted her behind in one perfectly judged manoeuvre.
Batchelor struggled into his coat and said thank you and goodbye to the maid, then trotted off down the corridor in hot pursuit of the groom.
The man was waiting around the corner leading to the stables, leaning on a wall and rolling what was possibly the thinnest cigarette Batchelor had ever seen. Striking a match on the wall and lighting up, Butler looked at Batchelor under his lashes.
‘So, you want to know about old Charlie and his shenanigans, do you?’ he said, picking a piece of tobacco off his tongue.
‘Heavens, no,’ Batchelor protested. ‘I’m just here to write an article …’
‘Don’t give me that,’ the groom said. ‘I reckon …’ He looked up at the sky as though doing a complex equation. ‘I reckon you’re a private snoop, here to look into old Charlie’s death.’ He looked Batchelor straight in the face. ‘That’s what I think.’
Batchelor toyed with continuing to deny it, but although the man was small, he was wiry, and Batchelor wasn’t at all sure who would come out best if it was reduced to fisticuffs. ‘How do you know?’ he said. If it was something really obvious, he would take pains to avoid it in the future.
‘Don’t worry,’ the groom said, laughing. ‘I saw your card on his desk one time and I heard young Miss Georgy call your friend Mr Grand when she let him in at the front door. Grand and Batchelor, enquiry agents. It sticks in the mind, that does. So, you’re here because old Charlie boy was murdered, you reckon?’
Batchelor tried to regain the control of the conversation. ‘Not definitely. We are just exploring all avenues.’ He knew it sounded pompous, but it was out now.
The groom ground out the soggy end of his cigarette on the bricks. ‘Well, I could tell you a thing or two, that’s for sure. Such as, where did he go, the old hellion, when he wasn’t in the challey working. Or …’ and he gave vent to an evil chuckle, ‘whatever else he used it for.’ He looked at Batchelor again and laughed. ‘Yes, I could tell you a thing or two.’
Batchelor could hardly believe it. The answer could be as close as this; one word from the man and the case could be closed. But he would have to be careful. ‘Such as what?’ he said, trying to sound devil-may-care. ‘We have already found out a great deal, you know.’
‘You don’t know about this,’ the groom said, turning to go. ‘You don’t know about Miss No-Better-Than-She-Should-Be in Nunhead, I’ll lay.’
‘Miss Who?’
‘Wouldn’t you like to know,’ Butler said, disappearing into a tack room and closing the door. Batchelor turned to go and, as he was crossing the yard, the top half of the door flew open. ‘And you don’t know about this, neither,’ the exasperating little man said, blowing through his moustache. ‘You don’t know where he was nor what he did on the day he died. Now, then.’ And with that, he slammed shut the door and Batchelor heard the bolts shoot home. It was something. Maybe, with what Grand had discovered, it might be enough.
Isaac had gone by the time Batchelor came trotting over the grass. He had swept off his jacket again and had slung it over his shoulder.
‘Have I got news for you!’ he muttered under his breath as he reached the road. Brunt had said that there were goings-on in the shrubbery – you couldn’t be too careful.
‘Not as impressive, I’ll wager, as the news I’ve got for you,’ Grand countered.
Batchelor held up his hand. ‘Not here, Matthew. Rhododendrons have ears.’
And that came as news in itself to Matthew Grand.
One by one, Grand and Batchelor interviewed as many of the late Charles Dickens’s children as they could find. They focused on those who had attended the funeral and found them exactly as George Sala had told them they would. They had all loved their father, especially the Snodgering Blee, who sobbed throughout the entire interview and told them that the world was an emptier place without him.
They drew straws for the close friends; it was Batchelor who got Ouvry, the solicitor. An articled clerk showed him into a palatial waiting room, the wall heavy with framed credentials. Frederic Ouvry, Batchelor guessed, was in his late fifties, more or less the late Dickens’s age, and his offices at 66 Lincoln’s Inn Fields were a revelation. He was not there when Batchelor was shown in and was told to wait, so the ex-journalist took the opportunity to drool over his leather-bound volumes. They were wall-to-wall and extended to the ceiling.
‘No,’ a voice made Batchelor jump. ‘I know I shouldn’t keep my first folios at fingering level. They’d be safer higher up. But, like you, I can’t resist a fondle every now and then.’
Batchelor was embarrassed. He glanced back at the Shakespeare editions to make sure he had left no marks on the binding. ‘I’m sorry,’ he mumbled.
‘Don’t be, don’t be. Had they been original Marlowes, now, I might have recourse to take umbrage. Frederic Ouvry.’ The solicitor held out his hand. ‘And you are …?’
‘Sorry,’ Batchelor said, for the second time in as many minutes. ‘My card.’ He whipped it out.
‘“No stone unturned”,’ Ouvry read. ‘Intriguing, Mr Grand.’
‘Er … Batchelor,’ Batchelor said.
‘I see.’ Ouvry ushered his visitor to an uncompromising Chesterfield, polished by the crinolines of clients without number. ‘But I’m afraid we already have people for our enquiry work.’
‘You do?’
‘Why, yes.’ Ouvry sat behind his desk and spent a little while arranging his pens just so on a ghastly inkstand which from Batchelor’s angle appeared to be covered in lizards and snails; clearly, a trick of the light. ‘You probably know him – a Mr Polliak.’
‘Paddington Pollaky?’
Ouvry chuckled. ‘That is the … umm … monicker he uses, yes.’
‘Well, I haven’t met him, but a friend of mine has met a friend of his.’
Ouvry looked confused.
‘Er … ex-Chief Inspector Field?’
Ouvry snorted. ‘Charlie Field!’ He disappeared below his desk and emerged seconds later with a decanter and two glasses. ‘Port, Mr Batchelor?’
‘Thank you, that’s very kind.’
‘No, forgive me for that outburst just then; but Charlie Field … We used to employ them both, Pollaky and Field, when they were still partners. The trouble with Field is that he couldn’t let the job go. Still referring to himself as chief inspector years after he’d hung up his truncheon. Here’s lead in your probate!’ and he passed Batchelor a tincture of the ruby.
‘Cheers.’ Batchelor sipped. Good. Expensive. Clearly Ouvry’s side of the law was the place to be. Enquiry agents, perhaps not so much.
‘So, you see,’ Ouvry savoured the burgundy elixir, ‘if it’s work you want, I’m afraid …’
‘No,’ Batchelor corrected him. ‘It’s about Charles Dickens.’
‘Charles?’ Ouvry frown
ed. ‘What about him?’
‘My colleague and I are of the opinion that he was murdered.’
Ouvry paused in mid-swig, then finished the port and put the glass down, heavily. ‘Are you insane?’ His voice was barely audible.
‘No, sir. I assure you …’
‘Haemorrhage of the brain, sir,’ Ouvry said. ‘A stroke, in layman’s terms. Talk to Dr Beard.’
‘I have.’
‘Well, then.’
‘He expressed some doubts,’ Batchelor lied. He hated doing it, but in for a penny, he thought, and solicitor Ouvry was showing all the signs of most of the rest of Dickens’s ménage by clamming up when anything suspect was raised.
‘Did he?’ Ouvry blinked. ‘Well, let’s see.’ He was pouring himself another port and upset his stack of pens as he did so. ‘Bugger! Let me see, in the years I knew him, Charles had rheumatism, swollen feet – he denied gout flat out – piles, of course (but then, who doesn’t?) … oh, there was that unfortunate small malady …’
‘Small malady?’
Ouvry took another swig. ‘We are all men of the world, Batchelor; surely I don’t have to be too specific. Bathing at Broadstairs wouldn’t do the trick. As Charles himself put it to me, when I hadn’t been in his service long, “I suppose there is no nitrate of silver in the ocean”.’
Batchelor still looked blank.
‘The pox, man. Cupid’s measles. I thought you were an enquiry agent.’
‘But none of this was likely to kill him, surely?’ Batchelor was thinking aloud.
‘No. No, I told you. It was a stroke.’
‘Cui bono, Mr Ouvry?’ Batchelor asked.
The solicitor’s face darkened. ‘You sit there, sir,’ he said, ‘quoting Cicero to me? You have the bare-faced cheek? It’s none of your business who benefits from Charles Dickens’s death, Mr Batchelor; none whatever. He was a rich man, as you would expect from the country’s most prolific writer. How he crammed such an output into one day, I will never know. So, yes, he was wealthy. Yes, he had various properties hither and yon. Yes, the man was a friend of mine and therefore, no, I have no intention of telling you anything else. That wooden thing over there, sir, is the door. Please take yourself through it. And think yourself lucky I have not charged you for my time.’
