A Study in Revenge

by Kieran Shields

  “We’re done,” Doran announced quietly.

  “Finally,” the diminutive man answered. He crushed out his cigarette and readied himself to leave. “Thought you said this Grey fellow was smart.”

  “What do you mean?” Doran asked.

  “Well, he’s been in there a while, with the Webster woman, no doubt. I’m thinking he means to spend the night. One of the servants came out ten minutes back and took off for the day. Even had his luggage with him. And Grey’s still left his driver right out front. Not being too sly about the fact that he’s paying the young lady a long visit.”

  Doran decided to linger after he sent McCrink off. He lit a cigar while he stood there watching the house. Quiet minutes drifted past. His cigar was burning down toward the end. That was the deal he’d set with himself. When the cigar was out, he’d do something besides just stand there waiting for Perceval Grey to make an appearance. He took the cigar from his mouth, wanting it to last a few moments longer while he sorted out what to do next. The whole scene was queer. The house was dark. No one was moving around inside. The young Webster woman was still in there. Otherwise there’d be no call for Grey to still be nosing about. That had to be the explanation. They were inside moving about plenty, just not the kind of moving you do in a lit room in front of the window, where peeping Tom Doran can get an eyeful of you.

  One big fat problem kept kicking around in his brain. Grey’s carriage and his driver, Rasmus Hansen, were parked right there out front, beneath a streetlamp. Rasmus was reading the evening edition through for the second time. Doran knew the driver from before, when Rasmus worked for Dr. Steig. It was natural to get used to waiting around when you drove for a doctor who could be called out at all hours. But Rasmus was no fool neither. If Grey was inside with the Webster woman, Rasmus would be discreet. He wouldn’t announce his employer’s presence by parking directly out front.

  After a last puff on the cigar nub, Doran tossed it aside and lumbered down the sidewalk toward the parked carriage. The horse whinnied at his approach, and Rasmus glanced past his paper.

  “Big Tom Doran,” the driver greeted him, with a crooked but genuine smile. “Wondering how long you were going to wait there, lurking in the shadows.”

  “You knew I was there?”

  “Mr. Grey had your man pegged down as following us since we left High Street.” The driver folded his newspaper and tucked it beside his seat.

  “Well, what’s he on about in there? I’m tired of waiting for him. When you expect him out?”

  “Already. But I’ve learned it don’t pay to expect Mr. Grey to do what you expected him to.”

  Doran snorted by way of acknowledgment, then asked, “That Webster girl got her hooks in him? You figure maybe he’s in there working up a smile?”

  “I don’t reckon that,” Rasmus said as a look of serious contemplation come over him. “He was in one of his gloomy ways when he climbed in. Like he gets when he’s thinking too hard.”

  “That’s not good for a fellow,” Doran said.

  “True enough, but you know what he’s like. Peculiar. Seems to me the man’s only happy when he’s in a troubled mood.”

  “This is a waste of time. How long you mean to wait on him?”

  “Don’t know. He should be out by now, or soon anyway. And he don’t like to be interrupted when he’s up to things.” Rasmus took his hat in one hand and scratched his scalp. “Maybe I could peek in or give a light knock. If Miss Webster’s up, there’s bound to be a maid or somebody awake. I could give a light rap, see if I can learn what’s what.”

  “Go on, then,” Doran urged him. “My feet are aching with all this standing about.”

  He watched Rasmus make his way to the front door and peek in at the narrow side windows. The man gave the knocker a timid rap. Then he pressed his ear to the door and listened for at least twenty seconds.

  Doran was about to shout at him to knock louder when Rasmus waved him forward. Doran tromped up the walkway.

  “Listen,” Rasmus hissed at him.

  Doran didn’t hear anything other than a few faint sounds of carriages passing on the next block. He pressed his ear to the door as Rasmus had done. After a few seconds, he heard it. A faint metallic clanking sound. It almost sounded like heating pipes coming to life, but this was different, more urgent.

  “What is it?” Doran wondered aloud.

  Rasmus didn’t answer. He stepped away from the door and moved along the front of the house, peering in windows as he went. When he disappeared around the corner, Doran gave in and followed. The windows were all dark and revealed nothing. He didn’t catch up with Rasmus until he reached the back of the house. The driver had his head pressed close to a window that was not fully shut. From the moonlight passing through the window, Doran could make out that they were looking in on the kitchen. The clanking sound was still muffled but louder. It was irregular, several seconds of silence and then a burst of angry rattling.

  “Don’t you think this is queer?” Rasmus asked.

  “Queer enough.” Doran went to the back door and hammered on it with the side of his fist. There was silence and then, a few seconds later, an even more furious sound of metal clanging and rattling.

  Doran returned to the window and lifted it wide. “Here, I’ll boost you through.”

  As he readied himself to step into Doran’s interlocked fingers, Rasmus paused. “But what if it’s nothing? What if they’re upstairs and all?”

  “Then we hoof it fast around the corner. I was with you and you were with me, together minding our business over at Farrell’s saloon for the past hour.”

  Rasmus slipped through the window and unlocked the door for Doran before lighting a wall lamp. The kitchen was neat and orderly, everything set to rights for the night. There was no sound throughout the house.

  “Don’t think there’s anyone here,” Rasmus whispered.

  The clanging sounds started up again, and Doran led the way down to the end of a short hall. Rasmus loitered behind a moment as he found and lit a candle. Doran opened the door. The room inside was dark, but he could make out the white porcelain sink. It was a small water closet. There was a dark figure lying on the floor next to the sink.

  “Shut the gas valve,” the man on the floor growled.

  A second later Doran heard it, the low, steady hiss of the gas jet on the wall left open. He glanced over his shoulder to where Rasmus was starting down the hallway with his candle in hand.

  “Douse that flame.” The big Irishman ordered before fumbling in the dark to turn the jet off.

  “I’m handcuffed,” the voice from the floor said. Doran recognized it now as Grey. “Is the key somewhere?”

  Doran shouted the question back to Rasmus and then felt for Grey’s hands. The cuffs ran behind the sink’s drainpipe. Doran gave several strong yanks to see if he could dislodge the pipe and free Grey. The plumbing shuddered but held in place.

  Rasmus appeared in the doorway with a key held up in triumph. “This was on the kitchen table. Give it a try.”

  It took Doran a moment, but he got the key in and heard it click. They helped Grey to his feet and guided the unsteady man back to the kitchen.

  “Did you see her leave? Phebe Webster?” Grey asked them. “Did she meet anyone? Which direction did she go?”

  Rasmus shook his head. “Never saw her. Some worker left out the side. Carrying a heavy trunk. Maybe a toolbox.”

  Grey pondered this for a moment. “Rasmus, is my bag still in the carriage?”

  “Course, Mr. Grey.”

  “Right. I need you to get me to Deputy Lean’s house, and quickly. Doran—get to the patrol station. If Lean’s there, have him telephone me at his house. We need to find him. Now.”

  “ARCHIE LEFT THIRTY minutes ago.” Emma’s eyes wandered out past Perceval Grey, trying to penetrate the shroud of darkness beyond her front porch. “He was going to check in at the station, and then he had to meet someone.”

  “He didn’t pe
rchance say exactly where he was meeting?” Grey tried to keep his tone casually polite, but he noticed his own fingers tapping furiously on the doorframe and had to pull his hand down.

  “I don’t know. He didn’t say. In fact”—her hand circled in the air near her head as if cranking up her mind—“I don’t think he knew who he was supposed to meet. He mentioned that murdered man from a few weeks ago and Munjoy Hill.”

  “Where’s Daddy?” The demanding voice came from the hallway stairs. Beneath a pile of tousled hair were a pair of blurry eyes and the aggrieved face of six-year-old Owen Lean.

  “Back up to bed, young man.”

  “Has he done something with Daddy?” Owen pointed an accusatory finger toward Grey at the front door.

  “Owen, you march right up those stairs this instant. I’ll be up to tuck you back in.” Emma stared after her son for a few seconds, making sure he started his grudging retreat to his bedroom.

  “Sorry, Mr. Grey. Is Archie in some sort of,” she asked as she turned back to the door and saw Grey already down to the sidewalk and climbing back into his carriage, “trouble?”

  [ Chapter 55 ]

  RASMUS HANSEN URGED THE HORSE ALONG WALNUT STREET toward the intersection with North. The Munjoy Hill Reservoir rose up in the moonlight at the far corner. It was set back slightly from the street front, leaving enough room for two small houses to squeeze in at the immediate corner. Farther down, past the impressive embankment, three stories high, stood two more houses. Otherwise the massive structure, holding twenty million gallons of water, dominated that block. Grey ordered Rasmus to slow as they reached the intersection. He peered down North Street, looking for any sign of Lean or other suspicious activity. In that direction the reservoir’s steep embankment transitioned briefly to a more gradual slope that ended at the sidewalk. Across the street were a row of houses and a lamppost. That scene was too obvious and open to view. If trouble lurked, it wouldn’t be near either North or Walnut Street but away, hidden from view on the vacant north or east side of the giant reservoir.

  “Let’s get a look ahead. Past the far wall of the reservoir,” Grey said.

  The carriage jolted and sped forward, then slowed after it passed by the few houses farther along, approaching the Eastern Promenade.

  “Drop me at the corner. Then wheel about back to North Street. Wait there and keep your eyes sharp for Lean’s arrival,” Grey said as he slung his leather satchel over his head so the long strap ran across his torso. He hurried past some bushes that lined the sidewalk, leaving the greenery of the Promenade and the scenic but unappreciated moonlit vista of Casco Bay behind him. He skirted the two houses, one of which still had lights shining, along with a shed and a large barn. It wouldn’t do to have the homeowners coming out their back doors and shouting at him as a trespasser or thief. He didn’t wish to lose his only current advantage: that Phebe, along with any possible accomplices, thought he was still shackled on the floor of the water closet.

  He passed through a scant grouping of trees and paused at the edge to consider the reservoir and its surroundings. The natural lay of the land sloped up slightly toward the reservoir before meeting the steeper sides of the massively thick retaining wall. That embankment rose at least thirty feet above the surrounding terrain. Grey listened but heard no voices or other sounds of activity at the reservoir. He was tempted to make directly for where a set of earthen steps was cut into the embankment not far from Walnut Street. They led to a five-foot-wide graveled walkway atop the wall, which circled the entire four acres of the water’s surface. It would give him a commanding view but also instantly reveal his presence and make him an outstanding target. He abandoned the thought, opting to keep low to the ground while searching for the location of the night’s threat.

  If there was to be an explosion, it made sense for it to happen slightly to Grey’s right, closer to the northeastern corner of the rectangular structure. There were no houses that way. Fields and trees alone would bear the brunt of any debris or destruction. This large and irregular city block was mostly undeveloped, virtually the last such open space on Portland Neck. It thinned to a narrow point above where the Eastern Promenade and North and Washington streets all merged in a triangle at northernmost tip of the peninsula. Below there, down the slope leading to the ocean, Tukey’s Bridge stretched over to North Deering, across the outlet of Back Cove. Anyone mad enough to dynamite and potentially breach the reservoir would logically choose that direction, allowing the water to escape to the ocean unimpeded, with no danger to nearby houses or untimely pedestrians.

  Grey walked slowly toward the rear of the reservoir. The moon was about half full, providing enough light to allow him to see any obvious movements. He stayed close to the edge of a line of bushes and trees, cautious and stooped in an effort to reduce his profile and make as little noise as possible. He alternated between watching the ground before him and keeping an eye on the reservoir as he walked. Halfway to the northeastern corner, he felt his foot snag on something, and he stumbled forward to his knees. He glanced about and listened for any reaction to his fall. There was nothing, but instead of spying any offending root or fallen branch that tripped him, he saw a thin wire stretching across the ground.

  Kneeling there, he lifted it to his eyes. The wire ran off in both directions, the angle of its path indicating that it stretched from a thick stand of trees and brush directly toward the center of the eastern embankment of the reservoir. Grey took his satchel strap from around his neck and set the satchel on the ground. He searched through the various interior pockets that held his multitude of tools and all his equipment. His hand settled onto a thin metal file.

  Grey bent the wire into a loop, slipped it over the edge of the file, and started sawing at the line. Within ten seconds the wire snapped. He stood up, still holding one end of the wire. He was about to trace it to its source, its detonation device, when he heard a distant voice. He dropped the wire, whirled about, and listened. He heard the voice again, off to his right, around the northeast corner of the reservoir wall. He sprinted forward toward it. Upon reaching the corner, he skidded to a stop. Forty paces in front of him, he saw a figure standing with his back to Grey, broad-shouldered and wearing a bowler. Another man, slender and all in dark shades, faced the first man, separated by only two steps.

  Grey peered at the two men a second longer before recognition flashed into his mind. Just then he heard sounds of quick footsteps behind him. A shadowy figure was sprinting across the open grass, from where the detonator was hidden among the trees toward the reservoir’s embankment.

  [ Chapter 56 ]

  LEAN STOOD AND WAITED, A THIN RIBBON OF CIGARETTE smoke drifting past his eyes. He kicked at the ground on the back side of the Munjoy Hill Reservoir, close to the exact spot where they’d found the body of Frank Cosgrove weeks earlier. There was the occasional sound of foot or carriage traffic floating around the bulk of the reservoir, but all in all the midnight air was quiet and still. A single lamppost was visible over a hundred yards off on North Street, too far away to aid the limited visibility granted by the moon.

  At long last he saw a man cross over the street, glance about, then continue on across the grassy slope just behind the reservoir. From the handwriting on the note he’d received, Lean had been expecting a woman. Since he’d made no effort to conceal himself, Lean now assumed, however, that the man was heading toward him with a purpose. He tossed his cigarette aside, readying himself for whatever the encounter would bring. The man stopped five paces short. He was slender and walked with a formal gait, as if he meant to be seen making an arrival, rather than just going somewhere. Lean guessed he was an older man, though the fellow was dressed darkly and the brim of his hat hid his features.

  “Good evening,” the man said. “Where’s she at, then? Let’s see what this big problem’s all about.”

  The man sounded peeved and anxious, but Lean’s ear still caught the underlying tones that indicated a very well-spoken gentleman.


  “Just who is it you’re looking for?” Lean asked.

  The man recoiled and loudly demanded, “Who are you?”

  “Deputy Marshal Lean. And who might you be?”

  “That’s none of your concern. I don’t need to be accosted by the police, simply for being out having a walk.”

  The man backed away a step and started to turn. Lean drew his revolver. “Stop there, mister. I’m afraid you’ll need to answer a few questions.” He took two steps closer, wanting to get a better look at the man.

  “I’ll do nothing of the sort! Leave me be this instant, or I’ll see you’re relieved of duty permanently.”

  The man slipped his hands into his coat pockets.

  “Afraid not. Hands over your head. Now!” Lean ordered. “And for the last time: your name?”

  “Jason Webster,” the older gentleman said through an indignant snarl.

  “Lean! It’s a trap!” The shouted warning rang out from a distance behind him.

  Lean recognized the voice as Grey’s, and his head and shoulders swiveled in that direction. In the faint moonlight, he spotted Grey at the corner of the reservoir embankment. As he started to turn back toward Jason Webster, something hard connected with the base of his skull just below his right ear. The few faint lights in his field of vision all exploded. He dropped to one knee and braced himself against the ground with his left hand. With the last strands of surviving consciousness left him, Lean focused on not letting go of his gun. He felt his body slouch forward and knew that his head was now pressed against the earth. There was no other attack. No other feeling or sound reached him. He wasn’t sure how many seconds passed before his vision cleared and he raised himself up onto his knees again.

  He moved his gun to his other hand and reached for the back of his head. He felt a large bump and the warm, slow oozing of blood. Groaning, he forced himself to his feet. Jason Webster was nowhere to be seen. Lean caught sight of the distant lamppost and used it to gain his bearings. He turned around and stumbled toward the spot where he’d seen Grey. He tried to move quickly, but he was still dizzy and found it necessary to keep his head bent forward, focusing on where he was planting each step.