Crippen

by John Boyne

  ‘It’s never too late, Hawley. Admit it to me. She hits you, doesn’t she?’ He nodded. ‘She beats you.’ He nodded again. ‘What does she use? Frying pans, pots, her fists?’

  ‘All three,’ he admitted. ‘And more.’

  ‘I don’t think you a lesser man,’ she said quietly, shaking her head, close to tears. ‘I think you’re in a horrible relationship and you need to break free from it. You need to get away from her. Before she kills you. And she will, Hawley. If things go on like this, she will kill you one day.’

  ‘I’d be better off,’ he said in so low a voice that she only just heard him.

  ‘You would not,’ she shouted, bursting into sudden tears. ‘Oh Hawley, how can you say that? How can you even suggest it? What about me? How could I possibly survive without you?’

  Hawley looked up at her, shocked. ‘You?’ he asked. ‘But what—?’

  ‘I couldn’t,’ she said firmly. ‘It’s that simple. I’ve never loved a man like I love you, Hawley. And to see her treat you like this. It makes me want to kill her.’ She stepped forward and, before either of them knew what they were doing, their lips had met and they were kissing. It didn’t last long, only a few moments, and then they broke apart, staring at each other with a mixture of panic and love. Ethel looked as if she was ready to collapse. ‘I must go,’ she said, grabbing her coat and unlocking the door.

  ‘Ethel, wait. We should—’

  ‘I’ll see you tomorrow, Hawley,’ she cried, not turning around. ‘Just don’t let her hurt you any more. Please. For me.’

  And then she was gone. Hawley exhaled and sat down on a chair, scratching his head in amazement. She loves me? he thought. It was too unbelievable for words. He took his coat from the stand and locked the shop behind him, hoping that she might be still on the street outside, but she had vanished from sight. It was not the right time to follow her anyway, he thought. Now was the time to go home. The time to tell Cora how things would be from now on. That she would not be allowed to treat him as she had any more. That there would be no more shouting, no more violence, no more trouble. He picked up his stride, enlivened by what Ethel had said and her feelings for him, and he felt nothing but anger, directed mainly at himself for having allowed himself to be treated like this in the first place. Normally at this time he would have gone to the dental surgery, but not tonight.

  Back home in Hilldrop Crescent he expected to find his wife lying on the sofa, eating fruit and reading a book, her favourite early evening occupation. She wasn’t there but somehow he could sense that she was in the house. Two half-empty cups of tea were sitting on the table and he touched the side of one; it was still warm. He stepped into the kitchen, not really expecting to find her there, and he was not surprised. Nor was she in the bathroom, whose door was swinging open. He walked through to the bedroom but she was not to be found there either. He stroked his moustache and was about to return downstairs when a sound caught his attention. It was coming from upstairs, from the room where Alec Heath lodged. He listened carefully and wasn’t sure whether he had imagined it. But no—there it was again. Slowly, he walked outside the bedroom and placed a foot on the steps. He had not been up there since Alec had moved in, over a year ago, and had no idea what condition the room was in; in truth he no longer considered it a part of their home. Trying to make as little noise as possible, he went up the stairs, and as he did so the sounds grew louder. Moans and grunts, single syllables uttered as cries, while bed springs provided their music. He reached the top, the door was ajar, and he placed his hand on it, the pressure pushing it further open without any noise. Before him, on Alec’s bed, was a sight which at first his brain failed to comprehend, so strange was it to him. Lying down on top of the sheets was the boy they had rented this room to; he was naked as the day he was born, his long legs stretched out, his eyes half shut in pleasure as he moaned Cora’s name. Above him, sitting perched across him, was his wife, also naked, her breasts hanging down, a trickle of perspiration tracing a path between them, while her hand pressed down on her young lover’s face, forcing him further and further into the bed, pushing him down as far as she could while she sighed in pleasure.

  On the evening of 19 January 1910, Mr Henry Wilkinson, a twenty-four-year-old chemist, was working the late shift at Lewis & Burrow’s Pharmacy in Oxford Street. He was yawning incessantly as this was his eighth working day in a row, owing to the continued illness of Mr Tubbs, his employer, and he was thoroughly exhausted. He knew that if Mr Tubbs was ill again the following day, he would need to close at lunchtime or risk mixing the wrong prescriptions. He could barely keep his eyes open as it was, and that would never do.

  The chime above the door sounded and he looked up to see a man enter; he was wearing a hat, spectacles and a heavy coat, with the collar turned up around his neck. He sported a black moustache and walked quickly to the counter, handed across a prescription, and looked away without a word. Henry opened it and read it, raising an eyebrow in surprise.

  ‘Hydro bromide of hyoscine,’ he said. ‘This is powerful stuff. Your doctor explained the dangers of it?’

  ‘I am a doctor,’ came the reply.

  ‘Oh. Right you are,’ said Henry. ‘It’ll take me a little while to prepare it, though. I don’t often get orders for poisons like this.’

  ‘How long?’ the man asked in a muffled voice.

  ‘About ten minutes, sir,’ said Henry. ‘Would you like to wait or come back later? We’re open till ten.’

  ‘I’ll wait.’

  Henry walked into the back room, from where he could still see the front of the shop, and consulted a manual before taking the ingredients down from the shelf, pouring them carefully through a pipette into a medium-sized prescription bottle. There was something curious about the man out front, he thought. He was acting very suspiciously, looking at all the shelves but making sure of keeping his back to him at all times.

  ‘Nice night for it,’ Henry called in an attempt at conversation. ‘Heading home for your dinner?’ The man said nothing but continued to pace the floor, tapping his walking stick as he did so. ‘Suit yourself,’ Henry muttered.

  Ten minutes later, the mixture prepared, he stepped outside and put it in a bag.

  ‘Now,’ he said, ‘I don’t have to tell you to be careful with this, sir. Make sure you dilute one capful with five capfuls of water or you’ll know all about it. Says so on the label.’

  The man extended a one pound note and Henry took it, getting the change from the till. ‘I have to ask you to sign for this, sir,’ he said, producing a large black folder and skimming through it until he found the appropriate page. ‘That’s one of the drugs we’re not allowed to issue without a signature and address.’

  The man nodded, fully aware of this, and wrote carefully on the page: James Middleton, 46 The Rise, Clerkenwell. Henry glanced at it and nodded. ‘Thanks very much, Dr Middleton,’ he said. ‘Mind how you go now.’

  Outside, he took the bottle out of its packaging and read the instruction label again. One capful to five capfuls of water. Once a day. His heart beating fast within his chest, his lips dry, his legs a little weak, he put the bottle in the pocket of his coat and headed home.

  14.

  Inspector Dew Visits 39 Hilldrop

  Crescent—Several Times

  London: Friday, 8 July–Wednesday, 13 July 1910

  Friday, 8 July

  Inspector Walter Dew walked along Camden Road towards Hilldrop Crescent, irritated that he had to make this visit at all. Making rash promises was part of what being a Scotland Yard inspector was all about; in the course of any given day he was forced to deal with so many hysterics and fabulists that if he was to investigate all their wild claims he would never have time for actually solving any real crimes. He had planned on sending a police constable to the house to take any details which were necessary. A phone call from the London Police Commissioner, however, had put an end to that idea.

  ‘Dew?’ he asked, shouting down the ph
one as if he had still not grown accustomed to its use. “What’s all this about some Crippen fellow you’re supposed to be investigating?’

  ‘Crippen?’ he asked, surprised that the name had reached his superior. ‘There’s nothing to investigate there, sir. Just a couple of women with overactive imaginations believing the poor man has murdered his wife. That’s all.’

  ‘That’s all, eh? You think murder’s not a serious thing, do you?’

  ‘Of course I don’t, sir. I meant that their claims don’t sound too serious. It seems to me they just have a little too much time on their hands and have been reading too many mystery novels.’

  ‘Well, that’s as may be,’ grunted the commissioner. ‘But look here, I’ve just had a phone call from Lord Smythson, who says that one of these women is his sister-in-law and that she’s upset because you haven’t done anything about it yet. So she got on to him about it as she knew we were in the same club. Now Smythson’s a weak fellow, but he’s asked me to look into it and I can hardly say no. And I’ll have to tell him something soon, just to shut him up. So call round there and find out what’s going on, will you, there’s a good fellow.’

  ‘But sir, I have a lot on at the moment. I can’t just drop everything because some—’

  ‘Just do it, Dew,’ the other said, exasperated. ‘And don’t question me.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ he replied, replacing the receiver with a sigh.

  The internal politics of the Yard were a source of constant irritation to the inspector. There were real crimes and murders taking place daily among the working classes but no one gave them any thought the moment something troublesome happened among the rich. That very morning he had received a report of a body floating in the Thames near Bow and a woman who had been stabbed at her flower stall in Leicester Square. And instead he was stuck with this.

  He rang the bell of 39 Hilldrop Crescent and turned around as he waited for the door to be opened, staring at the dying flowers in the front garden which had not been watered in some time. A group of children were running along the street, chasing a small dog. The malnourished mutt was barking weakly and seemed to be lame. He frowned and watched as they caught it and lifted it in the air, and he was about to go over and intervene before they did the animal any further harm when the door opened behind him and he turned around quickly instead.

  ‘Can I help you?’ Hawley asked, adjusting his pince-nez to look more closely at the smartly dressed middle-aged man who was standing before him, holding his hat in front of him in his hands. Somehow, before even a word was said, he knew that this someone was here on official business.

  ‘Dr Crippen?’ asked Dew.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Inspector Walter Dew,’ he said. ‘From Scotland Yard.’ Dew was well aware that one of the most important moments in any investigation was the one taking place at that very moment. Typically, a person would either look frightened when confronted by an officer of the Yard, or they would look confused. He could generally tell in an instant whether someone had anything to hide. On this occasion, however, there was no perceptible difference in Dr Crippen’s face, a rare feat for anyone.

  ‘And how may I help you, Inspector?’ he asked, his arm blocking entry into the house as they stood there.

  ‘I wonder if I could take a few moments of your time,’ Dew replied. ‘Inside.’

  Hawley hesitated for only a moment before opening the door wider and inviting the inspector in. The house was deathly quiet and dark, and Dew looked around uneasily as he stood in the hallway.

  ‘Please. Come into the living room,’ Hawley said in a relaxed tone. ‘I’ll make us some tea.’

  ‘Thank you,’ he replied, looking around. He was trained to observe his surroundings quickly in case they might be of use in solving a crime. The room was spotlessly clean and a bowl of fruit stood in the centre of the table. The cushions on the sofa and chairs were arranged at neat angles and the fireplace had been recently cleaned. It struck him how orderly the house was in comparison to the garden. ‘I hoped I’d find you at home,’ said Dew, raising his voice so that Hawley could hear him in the kitchen. ‘I wasn’t sure whether you’d be at work or not.’

  ‘Normally I would be at this time,’ he said, coming back into the room and laying out some cups on the table. ‘I haven’t been feeling very well this week, however, and my assistant has taken over.’

  ‘And where is that?’ asked Dew.

  ‘Where is what?’

  ‘Where you work?’

  ‘Oh. Munyon’s Homoeopathic Medicines,’ Hawley replied, pouring the tea. ‘Perhaps you know it? A pharmacy in New Oxford Street.’

  Dew nodded. He had seen a number of such stores popping up around London but he didn’t hold with them. The type of man who had never been sick a day in his life, he wasn’t interested in miracle cures and eastern medications.

  ‘I confess, I have never been visited by a member of the force before,’ said Hawley, as they sat down. ‘I hope it’s nothing serious.’

  ‘Nothing too serious, I hope,’ said Dew, removing a notebook from his pocket and licking the top of his pencil out of habit. ‘I just wanted to ask you a few questions, that’s all.’

  ‘Certainly.’

  ‘About your wife.’

  Hawley blinked and hesitated for a moment. ‘My wife?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes. We’ve had a complaint brought to us and—’

  ‘About my wife?’ He appeared to be amazed.

  ‘Your wife died recently, did she not?’ Inspector Dew asked, preferring to put the questions rather than answer them.

  ‘Sadly, yes.’

  ‘Can you tell me about that, please?’

  ‘Of course. What would you like to know?’

  ‘The details surrounding her death, mainly. When it took place. Where. Anything you might want to tell me in fact.’

  Hawley thought about it. He’d been aware that a moment like this might arrive and had prepared a speech for the occasion, but the unexpectedness of it now had made him a little forgetful.

  ‘Cora,’ he began, ‘Mrs Crippen, that is. She had a relative in America. In California. An uncle. And he wrote to say that he was very ill and had only a month or two left to live. This was some months ago, of course. She had been very close to him as a girl, and naturally she was very upset.’

  ‘Naturally,’ said Dew.

  ‘So she decided to visit him.’

  ‘All the way to America?’ he asked. ‘It seems a long way to go for just a brief stay. Didn’t he have any family closer to home?’

  ‘None at all. He had never married, you see, and was entirely alone. And as I said, Inspector, they had been very close once, and so he contacted her. She couldn’t bear to think of him dying without anyone to comfort him at the end. So she decided to go herself.’

  ‘I see,’ he said. ‘And where was this exactly?’

  ‘California.’

  ‘So she went to California to look after him and then—?’

  ‘I believe she caught a virus on board the boat and was feeling ill when she arrived in New York. She cabled me from there to tell me about it but said she was sure she would feel better once she got to her uncle’s.’

  ‘Do you still have that wire?’

  ‘I’m afraid not. I usually throw things like that away. I had no idea I might need it.’

  ‘Quite, quite,’ he said, making a note. ‘Go on.’

  ‘Well, then she had to travel across the States, from the east coast to the west. That must have taken it out of her further, I expect. I didn’t hear from her for about a week or two after that, but then the Californian authorities wired me to tell me that she had died suddenly. Her uncle had outlived her by only a few days and they were buried together.’

  Inspector Dew nodded and continued to make notes, even though Hawley had fallen silent. The inspector didn’t want to say anything yet; it was his habit to let the person he was interrogating say as much as possible in the hope that they might in
criminate themselves. Sometimes the pressure of the silence made them say more than they had intended. The ploy worked, for after a whole minute and a half with neither man speaking, Hawley finally found his voice again.

  ‘It was quite devastating for me,’ he said. ‘I never would have let her go if I’d known what would happen. I have heard those transatlantic boats can be death traps. I travelled on one once myself, when I left America for London, but I would not want to do so again.’

  ‘You’re an American?’ Inspector Dew asked, surprised.

  ‘I was born in Michigan.’

  ‘I’d never have guessed it. You don’t have any trace of an accent.’

  Hawley smiled. ‘I’ve lived here a long time,’ he said. ‘I think it’s faded.’

  ‘It’s been reported that there is no record of your wife being in California,’ Dew said after a moment, licking his lips and watching Hawley’s face for any perceptible change.

  ‘How’s that?’ he asked.

  ‘Foreigners are obliged to report to the authorities on arrival in a state,’ the inspector explained. ‘It seems there is no record of a Cora Crippen arriving in California.’

  ‘No record,’ Hawley repeated, thinking this through.

  ‘Nor, for that matter, is there a death certificate. Or any evidence of a funeral.’

  ‘I see,’ he said, nodding his head.

  Silence ensued again for a few moments, but on this occasion it was Inspector Dew who broke it.

  ‘Perhaps you could shed some light on that,’ he said.

  ‘I assume, Inspector,’ Hawley said, ‘that what you are saying is there is no record of a Cora Crippen arriving in, or dying in, California.’

  ‘Just so.’

  ‘The thing is, my wife was a rather unusual case in that she had a number of, how shall I put this, pseudonyms.’

  ‘Really?’ Dew said, arching an eyebrow. ‘And why would she do that? Was she a novelist?’

  ‘No, certainly not,’ Hawley said with a laugh. ‘She was a performer. A singer in a music hall. And in the world of the stage she called herself Bella Elmore. So it is possible she used that name in California. Or even her maiden name, Cora Turner. Or there again, it is entirely possible that her passport had her listed as Kunigunde Mackamotski.’