by Lee Jackson
THE LAST
PLEASURE
GARDEN
by
Lee Jackson
William Heinemann: London
Contents
Cover Page
Title Page
Copyright Page
Also by Lee Jackson
Part One
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Part Two
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Part Three
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
Chapter Forty-Four
Chapter Forty-Five
Epilogue
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Copyright © Lee Jackson 2006
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ALSO BY LEE JACKSON
London Dust
A Metropolitan Murder
The Welfare of the Dead
PART ONE
CHAPTER ONE
‘Who’s for Cremorne?’
The young man’s cry rings out along the paved embankment, echoing beneath the girders of Hungerford Bridge.
‘How about you, sir? Care to go down to Cremorne tonight, sir?’
The gentleman in question is a rather whiskery man in his sixties, on an evening stroll along the river terrace. He merely shakes his head and offers a regretful smile, as if to say, ‘No, no, I am too old for that – far too old.’
The young tout grins sympathetically. He looks down and rubs the brass buttons of his uniform. The tout’s coat is an eye-catching red, a deep crimson, upon which is embroidered a capital C, the mark of the Citizen Boat Company. He raises his voice once more.
‘Cree-morne! Departin’ on the hour!’
The cry carries far in the evening air. It is not long before it finds more receptive ears. For the tree-lined Thames Embankment is busy with promenaders and West End pleasure-seekers; the young man will not have to work too hard. Indeed, for every dissenter, there are two enthusiasts directed towards the wooden huts that serve as the company’s ticket booths, quite prepared to pay the fourpenny fare to Cremorne Gardens. And they do tend to come in pairs, two by two, much like the inhabitants of a certain famous vessel of ancient times, a good mixture of every breed of Londoner: the prosperous costermonger and his Poll; the shop-boy and his Sarah; the up-and-coming City clerk in sparkling white turnover collar, who walks in company with his Angelina, a muslin-clad creature, a zephyr shawl draped over her arm, a white rose pinned to her dress. And if there is no bona fide aristocrat amongst the steamboat crowd, there are at least a few swells, men who polish jewelled tie-pins and stroke their extravagantly long side-whiskers.
One couple, however, strike the tout as peculiar: a gentleman in his fifties, in a billycock hat and brown tweed jacket, and a younger man, no more than twenty-five, black-suited, with a fulsome white cravat. They seem an oddly formal pair for the Cremorne boat.
In fact, if the tout thinks anything, as he turns away, and resumes his vociferous entreaties to passing pedestrians, it is merely one word: ‘Coppers.’
‘Have you ever wondered, sir,’ says Sergeant Bartleby, unconsciously straightening his cravat as he completes his business at the ticket booth, ‘why we get all the queer cases?’
‘Stop your preening, man.’
‘Sorry, sir. I just thought, if we’re supposed to be out on the spree, I’d dress the part.’
Inspector Decimus Webb looks rather brutally at the cravat. ‘I fear it would take more than that.’
There is no time to reply. A nearby chain is removed and the crowd jostles forward along the wooden pier. Knots of impatient customers begin to form, as the more delicate women in the assembled company cautiously negotiate the wooden bridge that leads to the waiting steamer.
‘Take it slow, your highness,’ says a raucous female towards the front. Several of the costers break out in hearty laughter. Others merely tut to themselves. Meanwhile, behind Decimus Webb, a pair of men raise their voices.
‘Stop that scrouging, won’t you?’
‘Well, perhaps you’d be so polite as to mind where you put your bleedin’ hoofs?’
Most of the people nearby raise a smile at this debate. But Webb frowns. He is familiar with metropolitan crowds and possesses a sixth sense in such matters. He tur
ns slightly towards Bartleby, raising his eyebrows significantly, giving a slight nod.
The sergeant, to his credit, unobtrusively glances down and responds instantly, placing a firm hand on the shoulder of the first ‘scrouger’.
‘And perhaps you would be so kind,’ says Bartleby, whispering in the man’s ear, ‘as to remove your hand from the detective inspector’s pocket, and hook it – the pair of you.’
The scrouger turns a shade of white and his friendship with his neighbour is abruptly renewed. The two men hastily push back through the throng under Bartleby’s watchful gaze. The crowd, quite oblivious, moves forward.
‘We should have taken them down to Bow Street, sir,’ says Bartleby, as they finally reach the steamer.
‘And spend half the night at the police court? Don’t you want to get to Cremorne, Sergeant?’
‘Me, sir? I’m quite looking forward to it.’
The two policemen find a spot up on deck and it takes only a matter of minutes for the steamer to receive its full complement of passengers. The ropes are loosed from the moorings and the sound of the boat’s engine, already rumbling below, changes its pitch. The machinery emits a reverberating rattle and, with a puff of steam from its tall funnel, the vessel moves off. Twin paddle-wheels direct it beneath the iron railway bridge that spans the river, linking Charing Cross Station with the south bank.
‘Not going below, sir?’ asks Bartleby, gesturing towards the trap-door and steps that descend into the lower deck, where liquid refreshment is on sale.
Webb shakes his head. ‘It will be far too cramped for my liking and I much prefer to see where I’m going, even on this fool’s errand. Besides, it’s a good while since I’ve been down to Chelsea; I expect it has changed a great deal.’
Bartleby casts a longing glance to below decks, but stays beside his superior. ‘You think we are wasting our time?’
‘The whole business is quite ridiculous. It is not a detective matter; not for Scotland Yard, at least.’
‘You think this fellow’s harmless?’
‘I do not think he is a modern Sweeney Todd, put it that way, Sergeant.’
Webb’s gaze returns to the river and, as the boat passes by, the breweries that line the south bank. The tall smoking chimney of Barclay, Perkins & Co.’s famous establishment wafts the faint smell of hops towards the Palace of Westminster. Webb looks back at his sergeant.
‘Very well, you may go below. Nothing more than a half of stout. Make a few casual inquiries. Doubtless many of them make it a regular night out.’
‘Thank you, sir,’ says Bartleby with a grin.
The journey upstream takes little more than forty minutes, the boat stopping briefly at Nine Elms and Battersea, though few come on board at either location. It is only when the steamer approaches the old wooden supports of Battersea Bridge, passing the giant black tub of the local gasometer upon the southern shore, that a perceptible change of spirits occurs amongst its passengers. Gaily-coloured shawls are gathered up, drinks are downed, hats and bonnets returned to their rightful places. Sergeant Bartleby takes the opportunity to return to the deck, where he finds Decimus Webb watching the sun set, its final rays dissolving into the murky brown silt of the Thames.
‘Well? Anything of interest?’ asks Webb.
‘Not much. They’ve all read the papers. No-one’s seen the fellow themselves but a friend of a friend swears they know someone – you know the sort of thing.’
‘Worthless,’ mutters Webb. ‘Ah, well, here we are, at least.’
As Webb speaks, the pilot guides their vessel towards the pier upon the north bank of the river, the wheels slowing to a leisurely speed, then stopping entirely. The pier is a wooden structure, illuminated in the dimming twilight by a row of gas-jets, mounted on a makeshift-looking iron rail along its length. Each light burns brightly within a large glass globe, casting a fiery glow over the waiting attendants who grasp at the mooring ropes flung out to the shore. The steamer is soon pulled in, its hull banging noisily into the timber piles, until it settles, bobbing gently upon the water.
‘Cremorne!’ shouts the man on shore, as the boarding plank is secured, the guide-ropes pulled tight. ‘Everybody off!’
The announcement, of course, is a mere formality. Nobody can doubt their location, even though the river esplanade that runs along the south of the pleasure gardens is not marked by any signpost. The signature of Cremorne is its aura of gas-light. It is not from any individual flame, though there are a dozen more lamps along the riverside path. Rather, it is the omnipresent radiance of the Gardens themselves: a garish, cheerful glow that, from the Thames, suggests a magical kingdom hidden from view behind the trees.
The passengers of the steamer all but run into the little riverside ticket hall.
‘Shall we make ourselves known to the management, sir?’ asks Bartleby, as the two policemen quit the boat, being amongst the last to alight. ‘I’ve met with the lads from T Division already, mind you. I know them on sight.’
‘I think,’ says Webb, ‘we merely watch and wait. If he is here, he will make a move. Now, Sergeant,’ he continues, peering at the queue for the box office, ‘tell me, do you happen to have two bob?’
It is gone half-past nine when the two policemen reach the heart of the pleasure gardens, the famous dancing platform. Its wooden boards are already thronged with people, enjoying the warm summer air. From the outside, the area is almost hidden from view; for it nestles amid a grove of ancient elms, and is surrounded on two sides by twin tiers of supper-boxes, which resemble the boxes in a theatre. But the stage that the boxes overlook is not of the regular variety. It is the Crystal Platform, a great circular rostrum in the open air, raised a foot or so off the ground, railed around by wrought iron. The railings are interrupted at intervals by tall triple-crowned lamps and, between them, above the crowd, arched iron festoons dripping with tear-drops of coloured cut-glass, sparkling in the gaslight. At the heart of it all is the hexagonal Chinese Pagoda, its upturned eaves and exotic fret-work painted rainbow colours. It contains a ‘Refreshment Room’ devoted to the sale of ‘Choice Wines and Sprits’ but, more importantly, upon the top storey, a thirty-piece orchestra, providing a noisy accompaniment to the couples gaily waltzing below.
‘They say it’s the place for loose women, now the Casino’s closed,’ remarks Bartleby, gazing at the platform as the waltz comes to an end, and the M.C. calls for a quadrille. ‘And those supper-boxes too. You can imagine, can’t you?’
Webb looks around at the boxes. Indeed, in a couple there is merely a hint of candlelight and indistinct movement behind a muslin curtain.
‘I know what they say, Sergeant, and you can spare me your vivid imagination. We are not here to grub up dirt. Keep your eyes peeled for our man.’
‘How do I spot him?’
‘In the act.’
Bartleby looks round the exterior of the platform. White-aproned waiters move briskly around the tables set on the grass, accepting the ‘refreshment tickets’ that are the Gardens’ particular currency. Men and women seem to lounge in an easy intimacy, listening to the resounding music, admiring the sets formed by the more proficient dancers. A blue-uniformed member of T Division strolls past, giving the two detectives a discreet nod. But no-one appears remotely suspicious. Plenty are inebriated; a good few may possess dubious morals, but nothing out of the ordinary, not on a summer’s night in such a place.
Then Webb taps the sergeant’s arm.
‘There – that fellow in the heavy great-coat. A bit warm for that sort of article, is it not?’
Bartleby peers at the man, upon the opposite side of the platform, a good two or three hundred yards distant. He is about nineteen or twenty years of age, flitting behind the dancing couples, with something rather nervous and awkward in his movements.
‘You go round on the left, I will take the right,’ suggests Webb.
Bartleby nods, and the two policemen begin to work their way around the seated groups, in front o
f the lower tier of supper-boxes. It takes them a good couple of minutes to negotiate past Cremorne’s revellers, but the man gives no indication that he notices them. Rather, he walks cautiously up to the queue for the sheltered ‘Money Box’ that lies just beyond the clearing, one of the small cabins where Cremorne’s own bankers change cash into tokens. He stands just behind a young woman wearing a dress of dark blue poplin, and seems to hesitate for a moment.
Webb motions to Bartleby to get closer.
As the quadrille comes to a close, applause echoes round the platform. And the man in the great-coat reaches towards the woman’s neck.
‘Grab him!’ shouts Webb.
Bartleby springs forward. The sergeant is both considerably taller and faster than the man in the great-coat; he tackles him to the ground even as the man’s hand touches the woman’s dress. The woman herself spins around in surprise. A chorus of exclamations break out from the nearby table; some express concern, but mostly they are words of encouragement, as if al fresco wrestling is suddenly upon the evening’s bill. Webb, for his part, stands to one side. Bartleby looks up with an imploring glance, his captive squirming vigorously in his grip.
‘I could do with a little—’ says the sergeant, interrupted by the necessity of avoiding the man’s fist.
‘On its way, Sergeant,’ replies Webb, as two men from T Division run round the platform. ‘On its way.’
Sergeant Bartleby says nothing, otherwise occupied. He is only relieved when, at length, the strong arms of the two constables prove sufficient to render the struggling man quite prone.
‘Sorry, Miss,’ says Webb, at last, turning to address the victim, whilst peering rather strangely at her shoulders. ‘I am a police inspector. Don’t be alarmed. Are you quite all right? Did he harm you?’
‘I think he took my necklace,’ says the woman, a little shaken, anxiously touching her neck.
‘Oh, damnation,’ exclaims Webb, rather to her dismay. ‘Is that all? Check the fellow’s pockets, Sergeant. Is there anything?’
