The Esther & Jack Enright Box Set

by David Field

  ‘What are they?’ Esther enquired fearfully.

  ‘Sore throat, breathing difficulties, stomach cramps, headaches, light-headedness, and — in some cases — hallucinations.’

  ‘Horrible!’ Esther grimaced. ‘Perhaps we should change our wallpaper — we’ve almost run out anyway, thanks to Jack’s incompetence.’

  ‘I warned you that the pattern was difficult to match up at the seams,’ Jack protested, then turned to look at Percy. ‘If we strip off the stuff we’ve already put on the walls, will that remove the danger?’

  ‘Yes, once it’s off. But depending upon how you strip it, you’ll be exposing yourself to even more arsenic. Put a cloth or handkerchief over your face while you’re about it. Does your new house have a common garden area at the back?’ Percy enquired.

  Jack nodded.

  ‘Then take the paper you pull from the wall in a bag down into the garden and burn it,’ Percy advised him. ‘And now it’s time we got back to work. Jack can go back to the Yard and extract Mr Mathewson’s no doubt extensive criminal history, while I’ll take myself back down to his room in Wapping, to see if the searches down there have yielded any skeleton keys. At least we know of one door we can try them on.’

  ‘If you mean Helen Trenchard’s front door, I’m coming with you,’ Jack insisted. ‘You two were getting far too friendly over dinner last Saturday.’

  ‘I can’t help it if I’ve retained some of my natural charm over the years,’ Percy grinned, ‘although Mr Mathewson wasn’t blessed with any of it during my conversation with him over the road there.’

  ‘He gave you no clue as to who his criminal associates might have been?’ Jack enquired.

  Percy shook his head. ‘Not yet, but he will.’

  Esher turned back to wave to Jack as the omnibus pulled away from its stop, then extracted the keys from her handbag and made her way towards the front door of her temporary residence, her mind still absorbing the implications of Percy’s warnings regarding the wallpapering and frustrated by the prospect of more delay while Jack’s first efforts were removed from the wall and burned in the rear garden. Then they’d have to choose new wallpaper and start all over again.

  She subconsciously noted the sound of someone inside working on a sewing machine, before snapping to attention with the realisation that there’d been no sewing machine in there since Isaac had used one for sewing pockets into men’s suits. As she quickly opened the front door and stepped inside, the noise stopped abruptly and she put it down to her tired brain and the likelihood that the noise had been coming from somewhere in the street behind her. After a brief supper of leftover soup and slightly stale bread, she crept up to bed, relieved that the capture of Bert Freeman was over without anyone being seriously injured.

  She woke up with the Sunday morning sun streaming through her window and the happy thought that today she could put the finishing touches to her wedding dress, which was hanging proudly on a hook on the bedroom wall. After breakfasting on the last of the bread, smeared with honey, she carefully washed her hands and carried the dress downstairs into her ‘office’, happily reminding herself that the Alliance would probably soon grow rapidly again, now that the man scaring member’s off was safely behind bars.

  She hummed quietly to herself as she sewed imitation flowers into the white lace overlay that she’d already painstakingly sewn onto the basic white dress cut from the pattern, then realised that she was humming out of tune with the faint melody that she could hear through the wall behind her. Not just out of tune, but a different tune altogether. She put down her intricate sewing and listened more carefully, then shivered when she realised what she was hearing.

  It was an old Hebrew folk tune that had grown familiar to her two years previously, when Isaac had hummed it in his curious high-pitched way that was totally unlike his normal speaking voice. And now it seemed that Isaac was humming it again, from the space behind her office wall that had once been his curtained off portion of the old workplace. But Isaac had been dead for eighteen months or so.

  Curious, but shivering with anticipation, she slipped out of her office space, through the soon to be outer office area and round to the back, where Isaac’s previous workspace was now serving as a storage area. As she peered, trembling, into the open and empty area, the sound of humming stopped dead and she shook her head to clear her ears. Then she walked to the window that looked out over Lamb Street for some simple explanation of what she’d heard earlier.

  Or perhaps only thought she’d heard. What had Percy warned them about hallucinations as a symptom of arsenic poisoning? And if she was suffering these hopefully minor symptoms, what must Jack be suffering, since he’d been exposed to the wallpaper and paste more than she had? She was looking forward even more to Jack’s promised arrival the following day when she could ask him. And of course, Helen would be back tomorrow and the place wouldn’t be so empty, and somehow eerie, with the growing feeling that someone was watching her every move.

  Esther’s excited anticipation of Helen’s return to work proved unjustified when Helen failed to appear at all on the Monday. When Jack knocked on the front door at around dinner time, bearing two portions of lamb wrapped tightly inside fresh crusty bread, she voiced her concerns as she put the pan on to boil for tea.

  ‘She probably took today off in lieu of Saturday,’ Jack suggested. ‘Where was she going, again?’

  ‘Luton, or so she said,’ Esther replied. ‘We got a letter from a former member of the Alliance who claimed that the man calling himself Bert Freeman was known to her. Helen was intending to go up there and chat with her and I was looking forward to advising her that we’d caught him and that he’d given us his real name.’

  ‘I don’t think he did,’ Jack replied gloomily.

  Esther looked across the table at him with raised eyebrows as she bit into her dinner.

  ‘I’ve spent nearly two days examining Criminal Records for a Walter Mathewson,’ Jack explained. ‘I found three and the worst that they could come up with between them recently was a “drunk and insensible” in Bishopsgate, although one of them had a bit of form for burglary and indecent assault. However, that was as a juvenile and was a few years in the past. If your Mr Freeman gave his correct name, then he’s managed to keep his nose clean with the Met for an amazing number of years for a man of his habits.’

  ‘Please don’t call him “my” Mr Freeman,’ Esther protested through a mouthful of bread and roast lamb. ‘Surely it doesn’t matter what the dreadful man’s name is, since you’ve got him behind bars?’

  ‘It does if we want to find the people behind his actions,’ Jack reminded her. ‘Uncle Percy’s not at all happy that I couldn’t find him and is now busy using the Yard’s extensive telephone network to see if they’ve heard of him in Essex, Middlesex, Surrey, or anywhere else just outside the Met. He thinks Mathewson may be a blow-in from the outer suburbs hoping to lose himself in the big bad city.’

  ‘Has he tried Bedfordshire?’ Esther enquired.

  ‘No idea, why?’

  Esther tutted. ‘I really do make a better detective than you sometimes. Where’s Luton situated?’

  ‘Oh, I see,’ Jack admitted reluctantly. ‘I’ll suggest that to him.’

  ‘And pretend that it was your idea?’ Esher challenged him. ‘While we’re on the subject of your failings, when can we go and choose some more wallpaper? I’d be glad to get out of here for a while. It’s getting a bit creepy, rattling around here on my own. I’ve started imagining things, which may be a symptom of that wallpaper disease that your uncle took great delight in telling us about.’

  ‘What sorts of things?’

  ‘Never mind. Let’s finish our dinner and go shopping. I’ll leave a note for Helen.’

  By Wednesday there was still no sign of Helen and Esther was becoming seriously concerned. Jack had taken to joining her for dinner every day, a process he justified as ‘pursuing enquiries’ regarding the burglaries that Mathewson, or whoe
ver he was, had been carrying out. By Wednesday he was prepared to agree with Esther that something was seriously wrong and with a reminder that he’d be resuming wallpaper duties the following day he set off after a lingering kiss.

  When the knock came on the door well after dark that same evening, Esther was preparing herself to reluctantly order him off the doorstep. But this time he’d come armed with his uncle and both of them looked as if they’d lost a pound and found a penny.

  ‘Can we come in?’ Percy enquired solicitously.

  ‘Of course,’ Esher replied as she opened the door wider to admit both men. As they stood there in the front foyer, Percy nodded to the chair that sat behind the intended reception area desk.

  ‘Best sit on that, my dear.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I don’t want you falling over and damaging anything. Either of yours or the Alliance’s.’

  ‘There’s only the counter,’ Esther pointed out, ‘and I could easily explain that to Helen, when she finally gets round to coming back to work.’

  Percy remained ominously silent as Jack took Esther’s arm and guided her into the chair.

  ‘She won’t be coming back, I’m afraid,’ Percy explained.

  Esther’s hand flew to her mouth.

  ‘What’s happened to her?’

  ‘She was found dead in a laneway in Luton,’ Jack advised her gently. ‘Murdered, so it would seem.’

  Chapter Twenty-two

  ‘How did you find out?’ Esther whispered, ashen-faced.

  ‘Depressingly easily,’ Percy told her. ‘When Jack advised me of where Helen had gone on Saturday, in response to a letter from someone who knew Mathewson, as he’s now confirmed to be, I made a telephone call to the police at Luton, which is a very small, self-contained, borough force that knew Wally Mathewson only too well and were delighted when he decided not to return into their midst after his most recent stretch for theft and indecent assault. He was, apparently, a menace to young girls in Bedfordshire generally and Luton in particular.’

  ‘Esther wants to know about Helen, Uncle,’ Jack reminded him.

  ‘Yes, sorry. I asked if they knew anyone in Luton who we could contact to get more information about him and they gave us the name of a woman...’

  ‘Mabel Barker,’ Esther announced in a flat tone that was indicative of shock. ‘She was the woman that Helen set out to visit.’

  ‘Indeed, and she may be able to confirm everything else we know.’

  ‘You may know, but Esther doesn’t,’ Jack prompted him grumpily.

  Percy continued: ‘The person I was speaking to gave me the address and added, quite coincidentally, that he’d been to that street only three days before, to a woman’s body that had been found only a few yards down from Mabel Barker’s house. I asked if it was Mabel herself and he replied that it was believed to be a woman called Helen Trenchard, according to a clothing name label found on the body. I told him that I knew a woman of that name, in connection with certain enquiries involving Wally Mathewson and we agreed that everything seemed to fit together. To cut a long story short, Jack and I will be travelling to Luton tomorrow to perform the formal identification and to question Mabel Barker regarding what might have got Helen murdered. The chances are that she was given certain information that someone didn’t want to have revealed and that may well lead us to the person who was pulling Mathewson’s strings.’

  ‘Do you want me to come with you?’ Esther said without any audible enthusiasm.

  Percy shook his head. ‘Best that you stay here and recover from the shock. In addition, I imagine that there are certain arrangements you’ll have to make regarding the Alliance.’

  Esther raised her eyes with a blank look.

  ‘The Alliance presumably died when Helen did. I can hang around here for a while, tidying up loose ends, but I can only assume that I’m out of a job. I’ll be making an earlier transfer to Barking than I’d expected, no doubt to Constance Enright’s considerable satisfaction.’

  ‘Mother will be delighted to look after you, I’m sure,’ Jack reassured her, ‘but you can see why I have to put the wallpapering on hold.’

  ‘If you show me how to do it, I can probably have it done in half the time, given that I’m unemployed all of a sudden.’ Esther managed to smile. ‘And it might even stay on the wall when I do it.’

  ‘You’ll probably feel at a loose end tomorrow,’ Percy observed, ‘so why not take yourself over to Lucy’s?’

  ‘I might, since you suggest it.’ Esther nodded. ‘But when will you be able to take your next days off, Jack?’

  ‘Not until this is over, probably,’ Jack replied, ‘but I’ll say what Uncle Percy was too tactful to say. If Helen was murdered for reasons connected with the Alliance and you remain living here, still working for the Alliance, you’re making yourself the next likely victim.’

  ‘I need to be getting home,’ Percy announced as he glanced at his fob watch, then at Jack. ‘We have an early start in the morning. I’ll meet you at St Pancras at eight am.’ He looked across at Esther. ‘I’ll leave you in the capable hands of my nephew here.’

  As the front door closed behind him, Esther rose from her chair on slightly wobbly legs and Jack took her arm.

  ‘Let me help you upstairs,’ he offered.

  Esther smiled. ‘Nice try. When your uncle announced that he was leaving me in the capable hands of his nephew, he had no idea of what his nephew’s hands were capable of. I’ll see myself to bed, thank you all the same.’

  ‘Spoilsport,’ Jack muttered as he kissed her warmly on the lips.

  ‘That’s definitely Helen Trenchard,’ Percy confirmed the following morning, as he looked down at the body on the mortuary table. Jack looked the other way.

  ‘Manual strangulation,’ the pathologist advised him as he pointed to the blackened area around the throat that had been surgically incised. ‘Fractured hyoid bone. A dead giveaway.’

  ‘Unfortunate use of words,’ Percy replied laconically. ‘May we see the possessions?’

  ‘On the table over there,’ the pathologist said, nodding to it. Percy and Jack walked across the room to examine them.

  ‘Take a look in this handbag. What do you deduce?’ Percy asked Jack.

  ‘Robbery,’ Jack replied enthusiastically. ‘There’s no purse.’

  ‘Good. Now what else?’

  ‘Nothing. There’s nothing in the handbag.’

  ‘Precisely. Yet we’re advised that Miss Trenchard was a keen unionist who was visiting a former member who could give her information about Mathewson. If you’d set out on a mission like that, would you not have taken at least a notebook and pencil?’

  ‘Yes, but I’m a police officer.’

  ‘And a very unobservant one. How did she get here?’

  ‘By train — at least, that was her intention.’

  ‘Precisely. Do you see the return half of her ticket?’

  ‘Perhaps she bought a single.’

  ‘And perhaps I’ll be the next Pope. Assuming that she bought a return, why did her murderer take the return half?’

  ‘To use it himself?’

  ‘Or perhaps to conceal where the victim had come from.’

  ‘A lot of people use St Pancras, Uncle. How could anyone possibly have identified her from her possession of a ticket to St Pancras?’

  ‘When they got around to interviewing locals, would Mabel Barker have not told them that she’d had a visit the same day from a woman who came from London? The next logical question for the local police is to ask why someone had come from London all the way into darkest Bedfordshire in order to speak to a waitress in the local cattle market boardroom. A finger then points to the Alliance and enquiries at the Alliance point to Wally Mathewson, who just happened to know Mabel Barker. Someone was covering their tracks.’

  Esther sat, utterly despondent, on the lowest stair, with her head cupped in her hands and her elbows balanced on her knees. She stared blankly out at the al
terations that had so recently been made to the inside of what she best remembered as a bespoke tailor’s business and caught herself wishing that it still was, until she reminded herself that those were the days before she met Jack. She wondered how they were getting on in Luton and wished that Jack was there beside her. Not to give her any practical advice — he was useless at anything like that — but to make her feel wanted and valued, with a purpose in life that made it worth the effort of living it.

  Somehow she had to honour Helen’s memory by ensuring that the Alliance closed down with dignity and with its books in proper order. She had been trusted enough to be given operational access to the account with the local bank, so she knew that there was enough in there to keep paying her wages of ten shillings a week. This had been almost an irrelevance from the start, given her independent wealth at that time, but following the purchase of the Clerkenwell rooms and other expenses including decorating materials, it might become important in the future.

  She’d never been in the job for the money though; it had been more a matter of pride and an excuse not to fall into the fulltime clutches of Constance Enright. The way Esther felt every time that she and Jack made bodily contact left her in no doubt that she’d be a mother well before the June of the following year and she’d been hoping to prove her value as a working woman before being thrown onto the same childbirth roundabout as every other married woman — and many unmarried ones — with the reduced status that society afforded all mothers, as if rearing the next generation wasn’t the most important work in human society.

  Thoughts about her forthcoming marriage reminded her that she was obliged by law to live in Barking for the entire month before the proclaiming of the ‘banns’ in the local parish church, according to that odious vicar. Since those banns had to be proclaimed for three consecutive weeks after that, Esher was committed to a seven week sojourn in Barking that felt like an impending prison sentence. The least she could do, in her own defence, was to ensure that it was no longer than that.