The Laws of Murder: A Charles Lenox Mystery

by Charles Finch

  “You know how to end a party,” said Jane as they walked back up the steps. “You must have been terribly unpopular as a bachelor.”

  Lenox smiled and took her hand as they reentered the house. In the front hall he stopped at the table and looked through the calling cards on the silver rack—left by their visitors for the day, cleared at midnight—and at the stack of post next to it. Nothing very interesting. Jane, next to him, put a hand on his shoulder and kissed his rough cheek.

  “Are you hungry?” she asked.

  “Just a bit.”

  “I’ll have Kirk fetch something. Will you tell me what’s happened about Jenkins?”

  What had happened about Jenkins—it was a story that could fill many inches of column space. “I will. Have the evening newspapers arrived?”

  “They’re on your desk.”

  “I just want to glance at them. I’ll be along to the dining room shortly.”

  “Let’s eat in the drawing room, it’s more comfortable. Will roast pheasant do?”

  “Handsomely,” he told her, and then went to look at the papers.

  A glance was enough to tell him that they had been fortunate for a second straight day—Wakefield’s body had been discovered just too late, probably by half an hour or so, to make the presses. The morning papers, broadsheets and rags alike, would be full of the matter, of course—the death of one of the highest peers in the land—but the papers of this evening contained only news of Jenkins.

  When Dallington and Lenox had uncovered Wakefield’s body aboard the Gunner, the whole apparatus of Scotland Yard had churned once again into motion. First there was the constable who patrolled the dockyards (Helmer made himself scarce, perhaps wishing to avoid the nuisance of any questions about his semilegal brothel), and soon a fleet of his kind followed. After only fifteen or twenty minutes Nicholson had arrived.

  “Is it true it’s Lord Wakefield?” he’d said. “That’s what I was told.”

  “Yes, it’s true.”

  “Heavens. This will mean a great deal of attention.”

  “I should imagine,” said Lenox. “We would like to consult upon this murder, too, if you don’t mind.”

  “Mind! I’ll pay both of you, but for pity’s sake, help me, help me.”

  Nicholson smiled faintly as he said this, looking gray and washed-away, as if he had barely slept, and Lenox was reminded how much he had enjoyed working with the inspector that winter, before the opening of the agency. He was refreshingly without pridefulness, but sharp, too, and competent.

  “The three of us together will crack it,” said Lenox. “At any rate let us hope this is the end of the deaths.”

  “One a day might be reckoned too many by some, yes,” said Nicholson, shaking his head.

  Lenox had sent for McConnell. The Yard’s medical examiner hadn’t been long in arriving, but he was a harassed and overworked fellow, and would admit himself that he didn’t have the training McConnell did. The body showed no obvious signs of violence, which was odd.

  “Poisoning, do you think?” asked Lenox as a swarm of constables lifted the trunk up to the topdeck.

  “I don’t think it was natural causes,” answered Dallington, staring behind them with his hands in his pockets.

  “The salt to preserve his body, I suppose. The voyage to India is long and hot.”

  Dallington nodded. “Enough so that I doubt the salt would have done the job.”

  Lenox had shrugged. “It would have kept the smell down long enough that the ship was unlikely to turn back to London. Forty miles would have been enough, from what I’m guessing of the economic interests of the ship. Perhaps four.”

  “True.”

  “And very likely when they discovered the body, in two or three weeks, they would have buried it overboard. Sailors are madly superstitious about a dead body on board. They’re a breed of people that can find an omen in every seahawk, of course. A corpse is almost too ominous to conceive for them.”

  “Then the body would have been gone, with a cannonball at its feet, to the bottom of the ocean,” said Dallington, “and no evidence that it was Wakefield at all. We might still have been chasing him, thinking he had absconded in the middle of the night after killing Jenkins.”

  “Yes,” said Lenox. “Word to the Continent, police officers everywhere looking for him, hundreds and thousands of hours wasted. Now only one thing remains to be discovered.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Who paid to ship him to India?”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Helmer hadn’t been able to tell them the answer to this question.

  They went almost straightaway to his little stall, which was now, predictably, empty, the women who had occupied it before evidently not caring to make the acquaintance of the members of the Metropolitan Police force. Helmer, perhaps aware of his uneasy position, was now eager to help, though the prospect of a payout had gone. To Lenox’s surprise, he kept excellent records. Unfortunately even his precise ledger didn’t tell him who had let storage space AFT119.

  “That’s one of the captain’s spaces,” he said.

  “The captain rented it?” asked Dallington.

  “No, no. It only means that it’s a standing order—that the same person ships out in that space every time the Gunner goes to India. We call those the captain’s spaces, always have. See, look here. I have a list of spaces available for the next run right here.” There was a little diagram of the ship’s hold. “The squares that are cross-hatched are the ones I’ve rented. The ones that are blacked out altogether—those are the Gunner’s standing orders, the captain’s spaces. Four dozen, say. One of them belongs to Admiral Benson, I happen to know, because I stow it up for him.”

  “What does he ship?”

  “Scotch whisky, crates of the stuff. Don’t know if he’s selling it or drinking it.”

  “I’m sure he would appreciate your discretion,” said Dallington.

  Helmer looked indignant. “Which you’re the police, ain’t you?”

  Lenox didn’t answer the question, since it put him rather in a false position. “Who stows up the spaces if not you?”

  “The owners.”

  Dallington and Lenox exchanged looks. “We’d better ask Captain Dyer, then,” said Lenox.

  “I think it’s a capital idea,” said Helmer. He was at constant pains to prove he had nothing to hide, was even willing to let them take his ledger away with them, as long as he could make a copy first. Who knew where the ledgers for his secondary, less salutary business were kept. One problem at a time. “Though he’ll be wanting to set sail. The Gunner’s nothing without she’s on schedule.”

  Lenox and Dallington went back out from Helmer’s stall into the open air of the docklands. Dyer was standing on the forecastle of his ship, arms crossed, observing the constables on their business. He looked out of countenance. This was a severe disruption to his plans, of course. Lenox knew from his time on the Lucy that the forecastle was the preserve of the common sailor, but the quarterdeck of the Gunner, which the officers alone were permitted to use, was at the moment dominated by the trunk with Wakefield’s body. Its lid was open, the ivory relief of the corpse just visible above its edge.

  They crossed the gangway and went to him. “You’ve brought me a pretty peck of trouble, gentlemen,” he said, smiling grimly. “Though I’m glad the responsibility is out of my hands before we ship.”

  “Captain Dyer, I understand that the hold space with the trunk in it, 119 aft, is a captain’s space? Held by the same person for all of your trips.”

  “Yes, that’s right.”

  “Who?” asked Lenox.

  Dyer looked surprised. “Why, Wakefield!”

  Dallington and Lenox glanced at each other. “You mean to say that Wakefield let that space from you?” asked Lenox.

  “From the ship’s owner, yes.”

  “Is that you?”

  “I wish it were. No, the Gunner belongs to the Asiatic Limited Corporat
ion. They have nineteen ships in all.”

  “I’ve heard of them,” said Dallington.

  “How long has Lord Wakefield had that space?” asked Lenox.

  “Six or seven voyages, so it must be a couple of years,” said Dyer. “He once or twice came aboard the ship himself to stow his cargo.”

  “What did he ship?”

  “I never would have presumed to ask him.”

  “You didn’t feel obliged to check the contents of the trunk?” asked Dallington. “For the sake of the ship’s safety? What if it had been … I don’t know, explosives?”

  Dyer looked at him oddly. “The thought never occurred to me. Anyway, I imagine he usually sent liquor, European liquor. Nine-tenths of our hold is filled with it, either for sale or use.”

  “Aren’t the men tempted to steal it?” asked Lenox.

  “I know the drunkenness of the our navy is a national joke, but I have a crew I can trust—a crack crew. I turn hands away. They’d drop any man who tried overboard before I could do it myself. We share out the earnings, you see. All of us are here for the money. Anything that gets in the way of it is a nuisance. Like this, for instance, with all respect to the lord.”

  “The trunk came aboard this morning?” asked Lenox.

  “Yes,” said Dyer.

  “At what time?”

  “I wasn’t here.” He spotted a passing officer. “Lieutenant Lawton, what time did AFT119 come aboard this morning?”

  Lawton thought for a moment. “Fairly early, not after eight o’clock.”

  “I take it Wakefield didn’t bring aboard the trunk himself,” said Lenox.

  “No,” said Dyer dryly.

  “Who did?”

  “Lieutenant, who brought the trunk aboard?”

  “Two dockhands, sir.”

  “Did you know them?”

  “Not by sight, sir. The usual sort.”

  “There are a thousand stevedores on these docks,” said Dyer, turning back to Lenox and Dallington. “Any of them would have brought the trunk on board for a few coins. They had the correct tickets?”

  “Oh, yes,” said Lawton. “We always check twice, as you know, Captain.”

  How had Jenkins come by Wakefield’s claim ticket, Lenox wondered? And had he known what it was? Of course, it might have been a ticket from a past voyage, too.

  “Who took the contents of Wakefield’s hold from you in Calcutta?” asked Lenox.

  Dyer shook his head. “I haven’t the faintest idea. We’re often many leagues homeward by the time anyone collects what we’ve left, of course.”

  Dallington frowned. “What do you mean? Don’t they have to come on the ship and gather their things?”

  “In the Asiatic warehouse at Calcutta there’s a room the exact dimensions of our hold, and with all the same markings, too. The men simply transfer every box’s contents into its replica, and we set sail. India is a slow-moving country. They have several months—until we’re back again, in fact—before their things must be out.”

  “But who would have been permitted to take away the contents of Wakefield’s box?” asked Lenox, puzzled.

  “He would have had an arrangement with one of the local companies, almost certainly. The Asiatic office can likely tell you. I’d be happy to give you their address.” His eyes scanned the decks of the ship critically. “Perhaps it might persuade the Yard to let our ship leave port sooner.”

  Lenox made a note on his pad to consult with them. It was slightly maddening, this whole thing—they knew more than they could have hoped when they came to the docks and also less. Was Wakefield still a suspect in Jenkins’s murder? Or had the same person killed both men? It was critical in cases like this, Lenox had learned, not to let the second murder seem more important than the first.

  After they had finished speaking to Dyer and getting descriptions from Lieutenant Lawton of the two stevedores who had brought the trunk on board—which were singularly unhelpful, since nearly every man on the dock wore the same navy or black woolen jersey, and most were also “dark-haired, I think”—Dallington and Lenox went back down to the docks, where Nicholson was ordering people about.

  “Are you going to hold the Gunner in London?” asked Dallington.

  “For a day or two at least. This is a disaster, you know. Parliament will scream bloody murder. They don’t think the Yard monitors the shipyards well enough as it is.”

  Dallington looked around at the dozens of ships nearby. “It would take more men than are in London to monitor every hold of every ship.”

  “You and I know that,” said Nicholson. “This Wakefield—you know he owned a house on the street where Jenkins died?”

  Lenox nodded. “Yes.”

  “Did you suspect him?”

  Lenox decided that it was time to tell Nicholson what he knew, and he relayed it now: Charity Boyd, what Dyer had just told them, the mystery of Jenkins holding Wakefield’s claim ticket. “I think they must be linked,” he said.

  “Certainly it would seem so,” said Nicholson. He didn’t look pleased to be hearing of Lenox’s suspicions a day late. “What now?”

  “I think before the city gets hold of the news, Dallington and I had better go speak to the people at Wakefield’s house. Will you come with us?”

  Nicholson looked around. “Yes, why not,” he said.

  “Please tell whomever you leave in charge that McConnell is coming shortly. He can tell us at any rate how Wakefield died, if not why.”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  As the carriage horses pulled the three men toward Portland Place, Lenox glanced at his watch. It was still shy of noon. They neared Wakefield’s house, and almost as if on time for their arrival Lenox saw the high black gate of the convent two doors down open. After a moment two columns of girls emerged in a somber procession. Their eyes were trained on the ground. They looked rather old to be in school—seventeen or eighteen. Novices, perhaps. Behind them an old woman in a habit shut the gate behind them and locked it. Were they going on a walk to Regent’s Park? They turned in that direction, anyhow. Lenox sighed. It looked a grim life—orphans, most of them, he imagined, mixed in with a girl or two who had gotten into trouble very young. Still, they had better lives than many of the orphans in the East End. During the winter especially.

  When Nicholson knocked on the door of Wakefield’s house it opened immediately, as if someone had been standing near it and waiting. “Sirs?” said a young man.

  “Are you the butler?”

  “May I inquire as to your business?” he said.

  Nicholson showed his identification. “Scotland Yard.”

  “Ah. I’m not the butler, no, I’m the footman, sir. Just a moment, if you don’t mind, and I’ll fetch him. Please, come in and wait here.”

  He led them into a hallway with a black-and-white checkerboard floor, the walls painted a stark white. It had the kind of bloodless beauty one occasionally saw in the houses of aristocrats with very little sense of domesticity; there was a beautiful secretary against the wall, a small portrait of a lady and her King Charles spaniel that must have been painted the century before, and underneath it a complex carriage clock with rubies to mark the hours. There was no sign here of inhabitation. No umbrella stand, no letter rack. It was very clean, very finely appointed, and very cold.

  Soon a butler came, a pale man in middle age with a slight limp and dark hair. “Gentlemen?” he said. He had returned alone. “You asked for me?”

  “Lord Wakefield is out?” asked Dallington quickly, getting in ahead of Nicholson.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Where is he?”

  “Perhaps if I had some idea why you sought him out, sir.”

  Nicholson glanced at Dallington and then shook his head. “You might as well know—Lord Wakefield’s dead.”

  The butler, though trained his whole life to suppress the instinct, couldn’t help but react. His eyes grew wide, and his breath seemed to catch. “Dead, you say? Lord Wakefield? Are you quite sur
e?”

  “Yes. And I know from one of my constables that he’d been gone for a day beforehand.”

  The butler hesitated. “I suppose you had better come in,” he said. “Dead, my goodness. I suppose I shall have to look out for a new place. Not that … in the circumstances…”

  “How long have you worked for His Lordship?” asked Nicholson.

  “A little more than one year, sir.”

  “And how many staff does he keep?”

  “Five of us full-time, sir.”

  “All living in?”

  “Yes, sir. A butler, a footman, a cook, and two maids. To be honest there is barely work for each of us to fill our time, sir. Lord Wakefield’s needs are few. He lives—lived—largely in two rooms upstairs. This was his father’s house, and he has left it as he found it when he inherited it.”

  “Are all five of you here this morning?” asked Lenox.

  “Yes, sir.”

  Lenox looked at Dallington and Nicholson. “I think we had better see all of them now.”

  The interviews took not more than half an hour. All the servants told the same tale: a master they didn’t know well, though if he ever paid them attention it was because something had angered him, not pleased him. The cook in particular, a pretty, timid young woman from Lancashire, seemed intimidated by the marquess. She was just as ignorant as the rest of them about Wakefield’s movements around London.

  “What about visitors?” said Lenox to the butler—his name was Smith—after the interviews were concluded. They were sitting in a room with high vaulting windows and a view of a serene and exquisite back garden, with manicured hedges and thickset rosebushes. “Did Lord Wakefield often entertain?”

  “Not often, sir. Private dinners now and again—but even those were rare. He was most often at his clubs.”