“Obviously,” replied Moriarty.
“The missing man,” the earl said carefully, “the man for whom we have removed you from prison to aid in our search, uses Baron Renfrew as his incognito. His name is Albert Victor. Prince Albert Victor. The Prince Albert Victor, eldest son of the Prince of Wales, second in line to the throne.”
“Ah!” said Moriarty. “Indeed. That certainly explains the ‘men.’ You have a problem.”
[CHAPTER NINE]
THE MISSING PRINCE
Yesterday upon the stair
I met a man who wasn’t there.
He wasn’t there again today
I wish that man would go away.
—HUGH MEANS
HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS ALBERT VICTOR CHRISTIAN EDWARD, Duke of Clarence and Avondale, Knight of the Orders of the Garter and of St. Patrick, second in line for the British throne, tall, impeccably garbed, aristocratically slim, and handsome as a—well, yes, as a prince, and unmarried at twenty-six, was probably the most eligible bachelor in the world. All those who knew him remarked on his regal bearing, his courtly airs, his utter fitness for the role the God who looked over England had set for him.
Yet …
There were stories—rumors, actually—about a dissipated life and immoral habits that had to be carefully concealed from his grandmother the queen. Gambling to excess—but then, who will call in the marker of a prince of the blood? Any such debts of honor will certainly be paid. Consorting with women of a low character—but then, it is hardly possible to engage in that sort of consorting with women of a high character. Trips to Paris to engage in shameful behavior—but then, would you wish a royal prince to engage in shameful behavior at home? Surely, the wags wagged, we have here a case of wild oats being sowed before the prince must take on the somber responsibilities he is destined to assume.
Beyond these were the other rumors, whispered in shocked tones by those who had merely smiled at the first rumors. The fiend known as the Whitechapel Slasher, Jack the Ripper, or Fleet-Foot Jack had slashed and mutilated six women two years before and then had suddenly stopped. He had never been caught—as far as was known. Perhaps he had been, though, the whispers went. Perhaps he had been someone so important that charges could not be brought. Albert Victor’s name was, for some reason, often brought up in these hushed discussions.
Ridiculous, of course.
Yet …
It was but a year ago, in July 1889, when the Cleveland Street Scandal had whipped through the aristocracy and evoked awe and giggles among the lower classes. Investigating a theft at the Central Telegraph office, the police questioned a lad employed as a runner who was found to be in possession of the unheard-of sum of eighteen shillings. Young Thomas insisted that he had not stolen it but earned it serving as a “rent boy” in a male brothel at 19 Cleveland Street.
Scotland Yard raided the establishment. The brothel was devoid of customers when the Yard men arrived, but they gathered in some “rent boys,” who, aided by the gentle persuasion of the investigating officers, quickly identified as visitors to the establishment several army officers and an earl. The detectives traced a network of clients that soon led to the upper levels of British aristocracy, and thence it led—nowhere. A lid was clamped down on the investigation so suddenly and so tightly that it must have been someone with considerable weight doing the clamping.
Still, the story was too good to keep quiet, and the whispers soon identified Prince Albert Victor as one of the missing clients. True? False? Wishful fantasy on the part of the antiroyalists? Who could say?
The prince promptly left for India, where he was said to be having an affair with the wife of a civil engineer. The whispers had it that this rumored indiscretion was but a bit of misdirection conjured to draw the eye away from the greater evil. The whispers grew louder. The “Cleveland Street Outrage” became public knowledge. It was suggested in the press that perhaps Albert Victor was not a proper person to govern the United Kingdom and the British Empire, that perhaps his younger brother George would be more suited to inherit the throne. When asked, ever so discreetly and with due decorum, about this, the royals, together and separately, said nothing. The prince returned to England to ride out the storm.
Casting discretion aside, the newspapers took up the story and shook it as a terrier shakes a rat. Even terriers as far afield as the United States felt that they should have a say in the line of succession to the British throne. In an editorial, The American Daily Northwestern opined:
* * *
Physically and mentally he is something of a wreck and not half the man in all the attributes of a manly makeup that characterizes George.
Victor seems to inherit his father’s vices without retaining many of his virtues, and his connection with the Cleveland Street scandal is only another indication of the debauchery which too conspicuously tinctures European royalty.
* * *
“The blasted American newspapers are bad enough,” His Lordship of Scully growled, dumping the contents of a canvas dispatch box onto the table, and poking and prodding at the clutch of newspaper clippings that had spilled out, “and the Indian papers, of course,” he added, spreading them widely about the table and stabbing at a long article from The Calcutta Daily Anglo-Indian with a stubby forefinger. This one began “It saddens us to suggest,” and Moriarty read no further.
“But look at this—and this—” The earl stabbed and stabbed again. “Not even in English. German, this one, and this one’s in Russian or some such.”
“Polish, I believe,” suggested Sir Anthony.
“Same bally thing. And look at this one. French! French, by God! A bally bunch of foreigners telling us how … who … when…” Words failed the earl.
The Duke of Shorham leaned his bulk forward in his oversized chair. “You see the dimensions of our dilemma?” he asked Moriarty.
“I begin to,” Moriarty agreed.
“We can’t ask any of the usual, the more normal, sources for assistance because, even if there were any assistance they could render, and I don’t see what that would be, a secret like this cannot be kept.”
“Certainly not when it involves His Highness,” the earl agreed. “Too much is already suspected, or alleged. I won’t say ‘known,’ because I don’t know any of it and I don’t believe most of it.”
Moriarty frowned. “Doesn’t Scotland Yard keep track of the royals on a fairly regular basis?” he asked. “Look after them when they’re out and about, keep the hoi polloi at a respectful distance, that sort of thing?”
“In the regular way of business, yes,” the earl said, “but when His Highness is engaged in his, ah, irregular activities, he has some retainers from the household who look after him. They were doing so, as best they could, when he disappeared and that young girl died.”
“I see,” Moriarty said.
“Who could have anticipated anything like this?” the earl asked the empty air, expecting no reply.
“Why did you say, Professor, that whoever did this is not the Ripper?” asked the duke.
Moriarty considered. “There are many reasons why a man might commit murder,” he said, “but they seldom overlap. A man may kill for greed, lust, anger, fear, immediate gain, to eliminate a threat, or out of some sort of perverse mental derangement. Or, for that matter, for queen and country. And, once having killed, a man may find it easier to kill again. Then there are some men, born without moral conscience, who would kill you as soon as shake your hand. I have known several such.”
“Dreadful!” opined the earl.
“They are usually held in by the constraints of society and the severe penalties should they get caught. As a matter of fact,” Moriarty mused, “one is usually safer with them than with the other sort.”
Epp stirred, looking interested. “Why is that?” he asked.
“Since their murderous urges are not occasioned by any strong emotion,” Moriarty explained, “they usually find it less troublesome to solve their problems
by a less drastic method.”
“Ah!” said the duke.
“This is not true of spouse killers, or poisoners in general,” Moriarty continued, “as after an initial success or two, they seem to think themselves immune from detection.” He looked around at his audience. “But I digress,” he said.
“About the Ripper,” Sir Anthony said. “Surely, Professor, he falls into the category you referred to as ‘perverse mental derangement,’ does he not?”
“Indeed,” Moriarty agreed, “but such people run to patterns. Think of the derangement as a groove cut across the mental processes of the brain. This groove can cause them to commit unspeakable acts, but its direction and, let’s say, depth direct the sort of acts the madman will commit. The Ripper’s pattern is quite clear. Whether his atrocities are the result of love or hate, or some emotion not shared by normal men, he clearly directs them at those we choose to call ‘the fair sex.’”
“Women,” Sir Anthony clarified.
“Prostitutes of the lowest sort,” Epp added.
“That is so,” Moriarty agreed. “Whether this is through preference, or because they are easier targets than other women, I cannot say, but there are men of the same class who would be as accessible if he chose to, ah, access them. There isn’t a night when a casual eye cast over the gutters of Eastchapel won’t find men sprawled in a drunken stupor or a four-pipe haze.”
The duke frowned. “Four-pipe?” he asked.
“Opium,” Sir Anthony explained.
“Yet your missing prince, or someone assuming his identity, has killed in two establishments catering to the upper classes, and has not restricted himself to women.” Moriarty shook his head. “No, milords, gentlemen, the perpetrator of these crimes is not the Ripper, although he may hope you will think he is.”
“You seem to have made a study of this,” said the Duke of Shorham.
“I have, Your Grace,” Moriarty admitted. “I find the repressed corners of the human mind as fascinating as some of my colleagues find flowers or butterflies, or the sorts of ash left by different pipe tobaccos.”
Epp smiled a tight-lipped smile. “Or banks,” he added. “Or country houses.”
“Ah!” Moriarty said. “You refer to a different set of colleagues. Impetuous light-fingered colleagues.”
“Villains and thieves,” Epp growled.
“Mr. Epp!” the duke said sharply.
“Why, yes, if you will,” Moriarty admitted. “Villains and thieves. And, to their misfortune, not nearly as good at it as the ancestors of the man for whom we search. Or, for that matter, of most of you in this room.”
The duke turned his head to glare at Moriarty.
“Laws of inheritance and patents of nobility,” Moriarty expanded, “exist to preserve unto the tenth generation the ill-gotten rewards of our ancestors.”
“Must you be offensive, sir?” the duke asked, his voice an irritated growl.
“You disapprove of us, do you?” the earl asked. “We of the nobility?”
Moriarty raised an eyebrow. “My disapproval is easily garnered. Class distinctions based on the accident of birth are surely arbitrary and idiotic, as is easily demonstrated by the high number of idiots among the ‘upper classes.’ Are you seeking my assistance or my approbation?”
Sir Anthony raised an admonishing hand. “Let us get back to the matter at hand.”
His Grace the Duke of Shorham continued glaring at Moriarty for some moments, but then turned his eyes elsewhere and sighed. “Even so,” he agreed, “but what assurance have we that Professor Moriarty’s assistance will be forthcoming once he leaves this building? Perhaps, having been released from prison, he will merely fade away, never to be seen again.”
Moriarty smiled widely. “You have the word of a gentleman,” he told them.
The Earl of Scully sniffed. Sir Anthony looked doubtful.
“Being gentlemen yourselves, you should have a good idea of what such a word is worth. Perhaps more reassuring is the pardon you have promised me should I undertake this. Clearly it is better to walk in the light of day with a pardon than to skulk in corners hunted by the police, however inadequate they may be to the task.”
“That’s so,” Sir Anthony agreed.
“Add to that the fact that my first trial resulted in a hung jury, and that I fully expect to be found not guilty in the next, should there be a next.”
“Is that so?” Epp demanded. “In that case, and as you disapprove of the ‘upper classes’ anyway, why are you bothering to listen to us at all? Why not just wait in your cell for redemption?”
“Your problem is an interesting one,” Moriarty told him. “A missing man of high—the highest—station, a possible murderer and fiend, who must be located and retrieved quickly and without fuss. I can see the great danger to the government and the monarchy should he not be found.”
“A noble sentiment,” said Sir Anthony.
“Also, I confess that my cell is a bit too damp for prolonged occupation and a bit too chill for extended scientific meditation,” Moriarty added. “Now, to the matter at hand. The questions are clear; the answers less so at the moment. If His Highness is doing this, why? If he is not, and some agency has abducted him and is making it seem that he is guilty, again why?” He turned to the Earl of Scully. “No demands of any sort have been made, I take it?”
“None.”
“What has been done so far?”
The earl looked at Epp, who responded, “Given the situation, there hasn’t been much we could do. The uniformed force has been instructed to report any sightings of the prince, but we’ve put it to them as a minor exercise in keeping peace among the royals. Her Majesty doesn’t like her grandson being out on his own, him only being twenty-six, so she’d like an eye kept on him. That’s the story as they’ve heard it.”
“Anything else?”
“We’ve had people look in all the places he might be expected to go, including several obscure royal properties in Scotland and Wales, as well as the houses of his associates.”
“Required a bit of finesse, that did,” Sir Anthony commented. “I mean we couldn’t just walk in and ask, ‘You haven’t seen the prince wandering about here anywhere, have you?’ It might have started talk.”
“We’re looking into various other rabbit holes as well,” Epp went on. “Even going so far as to send men into all the opium dens in the East End. We couldn’t actually raid them for obvious reasons.” He shook his head. “So far—no rabbit.”
“What assistance may I expect?” Moriarty asked.
“Whatever you require that can be managed without revealing the, ah, ultimate purpose of the requested assistance,” Sir Anthony told him. “You shall report to Mr. Epp, and he or one of his men will accompany you.”
“I don’t think so,” Moriarty said.
“What?”
“I’ll pass on whatever information I glean to Mr. Epp, but I will not be accompanied by anyone, least of all a Scotland Yard man.”
“You see, Your Grace,” Epp said, waggling a reprimanding thumb in the air, “he has no intention of assisting. He’s trying to get shot of us right off, and that’s the truth of it!”
“Come now, Professor,” the Duke of Shorham rumbled, pushing forward in his chair. “Surely you will grant that to be an elementary precaution in a case like this.”
“Precaution against what?” asked Moriarty. “I have no objection against Mr. Epp remaining available for me to pass on whatever information I feel will be of interest. Then he can do with it whatever you gentlemen require of him.”
“But surely, sir,” the duke blustered, “you must understand—”
“I’m going to be requiring the assistance of people who can smell a ‘copper’ ten furlongs off, downwind,” Moriarty said. “It would probably be best if I didn’t bring one with me, and, as you don’t want them, or anyone, to have any hint as to what I’m trying to accomplish, we should avoid any hint of official connivance in my inquiries. This jo
b will be difficult enough without your attempting to shackle me to an official escort at the outset.”
“I don’t think you understand,” said the duke. “Mr. Epp is Number Six.”
Moriarty frowned and shook his head. “That means nothing to me,” he said. “Number six at what?”
Epp smiled a tight smile. “I don’t think he’ll be impressed, Your Grace,” he said.
Sir Anthony rubbed his palms together, his hands in front of his face. “You’ve heard of the ‘Big Five’?” he asked Moriarty.
Moriarty nodded. “The heads of the five divisions—excuse me, departments—of Scotland Yard,” he said.
“There is a sixth department,” said Sir Anthony.
Moriarty considered. “Ah!” he said.
“It is not general knowledge,” Sir Anthony explained. “Even in the Yard. As a matter of fact, its members are called ‘the Invisibles’ by those who do know of them. Mr. Epp is the undercommissioner in charge of Department Six. Thus he is known informally at the Yard as ‘Number Six.’”
“What does this department do?” Moriarty asked.
Epp spoke up. “Whatever is required of them.”
“They take the jobs that the others cannot handle,” said Sir Anthony. “Particularly where it is desirable that the connection to Scotland Yard is not evident. Their men are picked for their intelligence and their discretion.”
“An interesting notion,” Moriarty said. “Intelligent policemen.”
“Now, then,” Epp said.
Moriarty considered a mole on the duke’s neck for a moment. “It would seem to me that Mr. Epp must be invaluable where he is. Are you sure you should spare him from his important work merely to follow me around? Are there not other incidents or events that should occupy his attention?”
“At the moment,” said the duke, “there is nothing more important than what you will be doing. What, I should say, we surmise you will be doing.”
“Very well,” Moriarty said, pursing his lips. “If Mr. Epp or one of his minions wants to accompany me he may, provided he makes no effort to follow me where I tell him it’s inadvisable. He must take my word for that.”
Who Thinks Evil: A Professor Moriarty Novel (Professor Moriarty Novels) Page 9
