An Awkward Way to Die

by Will Thomas

  The room was long and narrow. We inspected every corner and opened the wardrobe, which contained only clothing, luggage, and the odd wooden crate tucked in a corner. No weapons were left by the killer, and if anything, the room looked bright and cheery, in addition to being opulent. I wondered how a former Shinto monk would feel about all this. He probably slept on the floor. Still, the carpet was softer than any bed in the East End.

  Cyrus Barker had opened the window and put his hands on the sill, looking out.

  “Over there is where I stood, by those bushes near the gate. Had I shot from there, the bullet would have pierced his chest, passed upward through his body, and exited through his shoulder. I suspect he was shot straight through. A bullet does not suddenly change trajectory from an upward angle to a horizontal level. Besides, it’s ridiculous to think that a man can shoot a pistol two hundred yards and hit a target he is aiming at in the dark.”

  “What about the spent cartridge?” I asked.

  “Oh, you believe the Special Branch, as well?”

  “Of course not! But what about the spent cartridge?”

  “I shot my Colt down in the basement before I left. I suspected I might potentially be going into a dangerous situation and I wanted to be ready. You have seen me do that before, have you not?”

  “I have,” I said. “I was just looking at the ambassador three days ago. He was walking around in our garden, marveling over what you’ve done. Now he’s dead.”

  “Is there a question in that statement?”

  “Don’t you feel anything?”

  “Of course I do, but if I contemplated the deaths of the people I have investigated over the years, I’d never finish a case. One must develop a thick hide.”

  “I don’t think I can do that, sir. Or want to.”

  Barker shrugged his shoulders.

  “Suit yourself, Thomas, but you chose the more difficult path.”

  He walked about the room until he came to the fireplace. It was a large and ornate Adams style, with classical medallions. It was too classical for my taste. He crouched down, perfectly balanced on the balls of his feet. At nearly half his weight, I cannot descend or ascend as easily as he.

  “Lad,” he said.

  I came and looked over his shoulder.

  “Footprints!”

  “Shhh,” he said, raising a finger to his thick mustache.

  “He came down the chimney,” I whispered.

  “And returned in the same manner.”

  “He couldn’t have been a large man, then, could he?”

  “No.”

  “Let us tell someone! You’ll be removed from suspicion.”

  “Let me carry it a few more days, I think.”

  “Why?”

  The Guv didn’t answer. He pretends not to hear questions which he doesn’t wish to answer. Sometimes he provides me with all the clues to a case. Sometimes he doesn’t, as if I am to infer the missing piece. One of these days I’m going to be fully trained, I told myself. I’m not sure I believed me.

  We both bent and regarded the foot marks more closely. They were small and there were only two of them. The visitor did not move about. He landed and then crouched.

  “A very small man, or one with small feet. A child, perhaps? You know they are used to make entrance to a building from a chimney, and then they open the door for their comrades. What are they called?”

  “Snakesmen.”

  “Right. Well, suppose a lad came down the chimney, saw the murder take place, and scampered up again. Then we’d have a witness.”

  Barker grunted. He obviously thought my scenario unlikely. The door opened then and the general entered. He bowed.

  “Gentlemen, have you discovered our murderer?”

  “No, sir, but we are progressing. Alas, this carpet does not leave impressions well. If I may ask a favor, it is that no one disturb this fireplace for a few days.”

  “Certainly,” Mononobe said, and crossed to the fireplace. He saw the footprints and clapped his hands.

  “Ah,” he said. “Mr. Kito will see that the fireplace is neither cleaned nor lit.”

  I had not seen the bodyguard enter the room, Kito, of the curling mustache. He nodded his head.

  “It will be so, sir.”

  “Do you require anything more?” the general asked.

  “No. The blood spot can be cleaned if you wish.”

  “Thank you. It is disturbing. This has become my office. It was to be that of the minister of arts, who had no office, but he graciously offered it to me. Perhaps the thought that a man died here made him uncomfortable. He is not as robust as I.”

  “We have yet to meet him. Tell me, sir, where has the body of Toda Ichigo been taken?”

  “Let me see …” He crossed to the desk and looked among some papers. He lifted one.

  “J. H. Kenyon, Edgware Road.”

  “Ah, the best in London. Thank you.”

  “Not at all.”

  “We have met the late ambassador, the general, and the admiral. What other envoys are in the delegation?”

  “Yes. We have the minister of trade, Mr. Akita, and the minister of arts, Mr. Tatsuya.”

  “Do they have bodyguards as well?”

  “They do,” the general said.

  “Are any of them in the building at the moment?”

  “No. Tatsuya is attending an event at the Grosvenor Gallery, Akita is in Sheffield, and the admiral is in Greenwich attending a naval demonstration.”

  “And His Lordship?” Barker asked.

  “He is staying at his club, I believe.”

  “Which one?”

  The general frowned. “Is there more than one? Forgive me, sir. I have no idea.”

  “It’s not important. Please inform them that I wish to speak to them at their earliest convenience.”

  “Of course I shall, but I must warn you that their schedules allow little time for conversation. Each has twenty or more events in a day.”

  Barker crossed his arms and tilted his head to the side, still looking gravely at his host.

  “Why so many? Now that the embassy is being established, haven’t they plenty of time?”

  Mononobe shook his head brusquely. “The ambassador was permanent, but the rest of us are gathering information and supplies in order to return to Tokyo. A complete staff of diplomats will be sent here after our return.”

  “Will you stay?” the Guv asked.

  “Until my replacement arrives. I hope you will forgive me. I must perform the ambassador’s duties as well as my own.”

  “Thank you for taking the time to answer our questions,” the Guv said.

  The general turned and left.

  “You can be very polite when you need to be,” I remarked to him.

  “Diplomacy works better than putting the thumbscrews to a fellow.”

  “True, but it’s not nearly enough fun.”

  “Come, Thomas.”

  We found a cab that took us to Edgware Road, and the squat, solid building of the J. H. Kenyon Funeral Services.

  “Nothing but the best,” I said.

  “They prepare the royal family.”

  We entered and discovered that Mr. Kenyon was not in the building. We were handed to a subordinate, a recalcitrant one.

  “Sir, we cannot merely show anyone in here. Do you have proof of your identity?”

  Barker handed him our business card. He was a wizened-faced old man with a pallid complexion. He needed a day or two in the sun.

  “This only vaguely proves who you are. The card could be manufactured. And how do I know you are working for the Japanese embassy?”

  Barker reached into his coat pocket and removed a letter, handing it over.

  “This is in Japanese,” the officious assistant said.

  “You need not inform me of the shortcomings of your education. There is the seal of the embassy. You are impeding the progress of our investigation.”

  “One final moment, sir.”
r />   Barker frowned and looked threatening. The assistant stepped back.

  “The body is not ready to be viewed. It is being embalmed as we speak.”

  “I have seen the process. It does not affect me.”

  “Very well, sir. I have given my warning. This way, please.”

  He led us down several corridors into an open room lined in white tile. The Guv hadn’t considered whether or not the process would affect me. The smell was sickly, almost sweet. There were tubes coming out of the body. Formaldehyde entering, bodily fluids exiting. There was a Y-shaped incision in the corpse’s chest, and the final indignity, the ambassador’s false teeth lay on the silver table by his head.

  Barker crossed to the table and looked closely at the grayish-white figure.

  “Has this wound been scrubbed?”

  “A little, sir,” the embalmer said. “We try to make all of them as presentable as possible.”

  “How did the wound first look?”

  “Like he’d been burned with an open flame. But we’ll sew up the fatal wound and cover it with some flesh-colored putty. No one will tell the difference.”

  Barker made a gesture, rubbing his finger and thumb together, as I pulled his wallet from my coat pocket and handed him a ten-pound note.

  “Make him as presentable as possible. He was poorly treated here.”

  “Yes, sir,” the embalmer said, pocketing the note so fast it looked as if it had evaporated.

  We turned to leave.

  “Sir,” the man called out. “You forgot the envelope.”

  “Envelope?”

  “It’s there, sir.”

  We looked at a table off to the side, with a tin top. Barker came forward and picked up the envelope. It wasn’t sealed. He weighed it in his hands and then opened it. He dug out a misshapen lump of metal.

  “The bullet,” I murmured.

  Barker held it up to the lamp on the wall, revolving it in his hand.

  “Smaller than my .45, and even your .44. It is misshapen because it struck something, presumably his spinal column. It would have drilled right through his heart, killing him instantly.”

  “That’s a mercy, I suppose, but not much of one.”

  He dropped the bullet back in the envelope and held it up for the embalmer.

  “I can’t take this now. I’m not going back to Scotland Yard. A constable will be along shortly. When he does, send along my compliments to Inspector Dunn. My name is Barker.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Barker left whistling, his hands in his pockets. He doesn’t believe in putting hands in pockets; it represents crassness in his eyes. It was his little way of celebrating.

  “Why didn’t you keep the bullet, sir?” I asked.

  “It’s not sporting. I’ll give the Yard the same chance that I had. They cannot claim that I had the advantage.”

  “They’ll say it, anyway.”

  “True, but they’ll be wrong.”

  We left the funeral office and passed along Edgware Road. I was deep in thought, and I supposed I was silent for a time.

  “What is occupying your thoughts, lad?”

  “I am at a slight disadvantage,” I admitted. “The Japanese are a closed book to me. Take their religion, for example. I know it is called Shinto, and they seem to like gardening, but I know nothing else about it.”

  “Then learn. Quickly, but don’t read anything which appears lurid or exaggerated. Their manner is different, but they are human beings, after all.”

  “I’m sure Trelawney Campbell-Ffinch doesn’t think so.”

  “The fellow does not trust anyone who is not an Englishman, including both of us.” The Guv leaned on his stick as he walked along Edgware Road.

  I hurried my step beside him. “That won’t help him discover who killed the ambassador.”

  “It might be too much, even for me. Aside from a language barrier, which is not a concern for me, there are many phrases and references in their language which can only be learned in Japan itself.”

  “Of anyone in London, I would say you are the most qualified.”

  “Then I must limp along as best I can. There are two of us. If we can’t work this out together, it is on our heads.”

  “Oh, good, then,” I said. “I thought this would be difficult.”

  “That’s the spirit,” he said.

  He doesn’t understand sarcasm.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  There is a certain narrow street in Limehouse which leads to a tunnel under the Reach, which in turn leads to a rather unusual restaurant on the other side. It is run by Ho, a rather rude Chinaman, who happens to be my employer’s oldest friend. The food is Chinese, for which, against my better judgment, I have acquired a taste. When Barker said we were going to Limehouse, my first thought was garlic chicken and soybean patties in yellow saffron sauce.

  More properly, the restaurant is a tearoom, and more properly still, it is a trap, a trap for information. The bland-faced waiters speak several languages and have the ability to remember conversations on the spot. These would be written down in Chinese and placed on Ho’s desk to be considered that evening. Some information would go to Barker, some to Mr. K’ing, who is the undisputed leader of Limehouse, and some would be left to the discretion of Ho himself. Occasionally the odd tip would arrive at Scotland Yard, foretelling a jewelry store would be broken into or a charity about to be robbed. Other times he sympathized with the thief.

  He is a muscular, dour, Macao-bred Chinese, shaved bald save for a long queue, with gold-ringed earlobes stretching to his shoulders. He generally speaks in Cantonese, and may feign being unable to speak English, but he can parse the language better than most Englishmen. Like Barker and Etienne Dummolard, he was a member of the crew of Barker’s ship, the Osprey, first mate, in fact, and he came to England a rich man. This was how Ho chose to invest his money and time. The restaurant has a reputation for being clandestine, and many plans, including both bills on the floor of the House of Lords and plots to steal the crown jewels were conceived here. Whatever the tearoom’s exact purpose might be, it certainly wasn’t boring.

  We reached the tunnel entrance and stepped inside, as we had done weekly for years, and crossed under the river. As we entered the room, two dozen heads turned our way and Ho knew we had arrived before we even sat down. There was no way to know what reason the Guv had for coming, whether to trade information, have lunch, or to see his old friend. In any case, I was not going to ask. Observe and try not to be seen observing; that was the order of the day.

  A waiter brought tea, and Barker visibly relaxed. The next I knew Ho came out of the kitchen in a stained apron and singlet. He crossed his burly arms and looked at us as if considering having us thrown out.

  “Try the rice balls wrapped in tea leaves,” he said.

  “At your discretion,” Barker replied.

  “What brings you here?”

  “Mononobe.”

  “Someone has redecorated your face.”

  “That was a gift from the Foreign Office and Special Branch. Trelawney Campbell-Ffinch and his boys.”

  “I prefer the Japanese to stay in Japan,” Ho said.

  “Either they are chafing under the restrictions placed upon them by the Americans, or they hope to play us against one another.”

  “I would, in their situation,” Ho admitted.

  “We have been hired to investigate the matter of the Japanese ambassador’s assassination.”

  The Chinaman actually burst into laughter. “Are you not the chief suspect?”

  “You seem to know everything about it.”

  “I really must have a flutter over the matter.”

  “Only if you bet on the right man,” the Guv rumbled.

  Barker’s cases generally became common knowledge among London’s underground. Often wagers are made on the outcome of a case. Ho was an inveterate gambler of all sorts: fan-tan, dog racing, cards, mah-jongg, boxing. He rarely lost.

  “Are you aware
,” Barker went on, “of some arrangement between Mr. K’ing and General Mononobe?”

  “Why would you think that? Have you come across information I haven’t?”

  “I was merely asking if K’ing, being in charge of the Chinese sailors, and the most prosperous businessman in Limehouse, might wish to come to terms with the embassy.”

  “Of course not!” Ho said. “It’s unthinkable. No self-respecting Han would have anything to do with an enemy of our people. Where would you get such an idea?”

  “I was speculating,” Barker stated, putting his feet up on the corner of the table in front of him.

  “Stop it, then, at once. And kindly take your boots off my table.”

  Barker lowered the offending articles with something like a wry smile. At least for him it was. Anyone else would think it a grimace.

  “Don’t think the other side is eager to meet with us, either. Too much has occurred between us.”

  “I’m sure,” I said, “the blame must be on the Japanese shoulders.”

  “Naturally,” Ho answered. “We have been gracious to them for decades, even forbearing. What have they done in return? They have housed revolutionaries scheming to end the Qing dynasty, and tried to decide how best to dissect my country’s carcass. I don’t like them establishing an embassy in London. They’re up to no good, mark my words.”

  I thought it more likely to be a result of native prejudice, but it is not likely one can convince a person through reason, after a lifetime of enmity. I did not see much difference between the two countries, but I supposed it was my own ignorance, that was responsible for that. I felt the same about the English, but of course, that was their fault, not mine.

  “Japan and China are natural enemies, of course,” Ho said.

  “China and the Blue Dragon are not the same thing,” I stated.

  Ho raised a finger to his lips. The Blue Dragon Triad was not to be named here. It was a so-called benevolent society whose nominal purpose was to tend to the financial needs of sailors plying their trade between Canton and London, but in reality, it was a secret society on the order of the Masons, save that occasionally a Dragon member was found floating in the river. I’ve heard tell if they peached, their tattoo would be branded off before they were thrown in the river. I’ve also heard the men were held underwater with poles until they drowned.