A Disappearance in Drury Lane

  Pomeroy answered, still sounding cheerful. “I resent you thinking I’d let sentiment stand in the way of me job. But if you think I’ll let the captain off because he used to scream at me in the mud of the battlefield, then we’ll send another Runner.”

  “I will decide,” Conant said. He stood up. “Please leave me, gentlemen. I have many more cases to hear today.”

  Beneath my anger and exhaustion, I let out a breath of relief. I’d not see the inside of Newgate today.

  “Wait for me downstairs, Captain,” Sir Montague said. “I might be a few minutes getting out of this chair, and I want to speak to Sir Nathaniel.”

  I agreed, and departed, passing a grinning Pomeroy and glowering Spendlove.

  Downstairs, I stepped out of the fetid air of the house to cold, brisk winter wind along Bow Street. It was mid-afternoon, sunshine trying to break through scurrying clouds. A coach—I assumed Sir Montague’s—waited in front of the house, so I waited with it.

  Spendlove exited behind me, putting on his tall hat. He paused when he saw me, and came close. “Mr. Denis won’t protect you forever,” he said, not bothering to lower his voice. “He might wriggle you out of this, but I vow to see the pair of you where you ought to be—dangling from nooses side by side.” Without giving me time to respond, he turned his back and walked away.

  “Have a care of him.” Sir Montague limped out of the magistrate’s house, his face twisting as he came down on his bad leg. “A word in your ear, my boy.”

  I waited. One of the foot patrollers came out to help Sir Montague into the carriage, but Sir Montague waved him off.

  “Spendlove has a bone to pick,” Sir Montague said. “He usually does. But he is dogged in his pursuit of Mr. Denis, even more so than you are. You have compassion. Spendlove has none. Do not stand in his way.”

  I hadn’t intended to, but Spendlove seemed bent upon standing in my way. “You sound as though you speak from experience.”

  Sir Montague’s usually good-natured countenance became serious. “A few years ago the Queen’s Square magistrate lent Spendlove to me to assist on a case. Spendlove arrested the culprit I had in mind, who was suspected of a few murders. Before I could question the man—I believed he had not acted alone—Spendlove had beaten him almost to death. Spendlove said he believed the man worked for Mr. Denis, and he’d been trying to get information about Denis out of him. The suspect died of his injuries before he could be brought before me. To this day, that case remains unsolved.”

  “Good Lord. Was the man connected with Denis?”

  “Who knows?” Sir Montague gestured with his large hand. “Spendlove has embarked upon a crusade against Mr. Denis, and he’s ruthless in his pursuit. All others must fall before his obsession. I’ve suggested Spendlove be dismissed, but unfortunately, the other magistrates say he’s a very good thief-taker, which is true. He lives well on his rewards for convictions. However, I would not put it past Spendlove to kill Perry himself and leave him in your rooms for you to be blamed.” He shrugged and let out a sigh. “But perhaps I go too far. If Spendlove had killed him, I believe he’d have made certain Perry was found sooner and you arrested right away. And so, I repeat, have a care.”

  “I will. Thank you, sir.”

  “Besides,” Sir Montague said, his cheerful twinkle returning as he signaled the patroller to come help him, “I want to have the joy of catching Mr. Denis. It must be carefully done. Spendlove will blunder, and any charges against Denis will not stick. Nice to have seen you, Captain.”

  Sir Montague let a patroller push him up into the carriage, and then he touched his hat to me and settled back into the seat. The carriage jerked forward into the traffic of Bow Street, Sir Montague raising his hand in farewell.

  *** *** ***

  I decided to walk to Grimpen Lane myself and see what I could see. Before I did, I went back into the Bow Street house to find Pomeroy and ask what had become of my walking stick.

  “Sir Nathaniel has it locked up tight,” Pomeroy said when I finally ran him to ground. “If it turns out not to be the murder weapon, I’ll bring it back to you.” He strode off again, and I had to be content with his answer.

  I walked the short way around the corner to Russel Street and into Grimpen Lane. I tapped my way along, the wind tugging at my coat and hat. It occurred to me that, bundled in my coat with my hat pulled down, I was as anonymous as the next man who passed me. I was tall, but I was not the only tall man in London, and many gentlemen used walking sticks. Whoever had professed to see me might have spied any man in a greatcoat bundled up against the cold. Unless the witness had stood directly in front of me and spoken to me, she could not possibly have known whether I was the gentleman she’d seen.

  I stepped into the bakeshop, breathing a sigh of relief to be out of the wind, and removed my hat. Behind her counter, Mrs. Beltan slid formed loaves into the bread oven of her fireplace, wiped her hands, and came out to see me.

  “Bad business, Captain,” she said. “What nonsense, accusing you of murder. I told that Runner, Mr. Spendlove, you wouldn’t have done such a thing, and that you were gone to Bath, but he had a bee in his bonnet. I never saw you near that night, and I usually notice your comings and goings.”

  I leaned on the counter, soaking up the warmth of the place. “Do you know who told them I entered my rooms? One of your customers, perhaps?”

  Mrs. Beltan shook her head. “I doubt very much it was one of my customers. The ladies come in, they know what bread they want, they tuck it into their baskets, and out they go. They usually are in far too much a hurry to be watching who’s going up to the rooms above. Someone’s telling lies, I’m certain. Now then, Captain, before you go—your new wife wouldn’t turn up her nose at fresh-baked bread or a cruller or two, even if she is an aristocrat. A gift from me?”

  “I certainly wouldn’t say no, Mrs. Beltan, but my wife is still in Bath.”

  “Never you mind. I’ll give you something to take with you, and you come back when she’s here for more.”

  So saying, Mrs. Beltan went behind the counter to her kitchen and filled a cloth-lined basket filled with good-smelling baked breads. I would feast tonight.

  As I left the shop, my gaze went across the street to the house opposite and its upstairs window, with the curtains open the exact width they were every day.

  I stopped. A woman who claimed she knew me by sight, who swore it was me going into my rooms. Sir Nathaniel never could have meant Mrs. Carfax, could he?

  Despite living across from the woman for years, I barely knew Mrs. Carfax. We nodded at each other in passing, occasionally exchanging greetings and remarks about the weather, but that was all.

  Mrs. Carfax was widowed and had lived in this cul-de-sac for ten years, so Mrs. Beltan had told me. She and her companion were thin and spare, with narrow faces and graying hair under large bonnets. Mrs. Carfax and Miss Winston dressed similarly, bowing to fashion only in the most cursory way, forgoing the braid, lace, netting, ribbons, or feathers so loved by Donata that made her gowns works of art.

  I thought I saw a movement behind the curtain upstairs. On impulse, I crossed the narrow street and knocked on the door of the house.

  And knocked. I backed a step and looked up again. There went the curtain, with the face of Mrs. Carfax peering around it. I waved at her and pointed at the door.

  The curtains snapped all the way closed. For the first time since I’d lived in Grimpen Lane, Mrs. Carfax had muffled her window during the hours of daylight.

  I knocked on the door again, annoyed. And again. At long last, the bolt was drawn back, the door opened a crack, and Mrs. Carfax’s companion peered out.

  Though the two women were similar in looks and build, I saw the differences between them as I studied Miss Winston a foot away from me. Miss Winston had large brown eyes and the regular features of a once-pretty woman. She’d suppressed the prettiness by scraping her hair into a severe bun and wearing a frock of drab brown that washed any color fro
m her face.

  “Good afternoon, Captain,” Miss Winston said. “Mrs. Carfax does not want to see you.”

  She shut the door. Or tried to. I put my foot inside it and forced the door open. Miss Winston looked at me in pure terror as I grabbed the door handle and held on.

  “Miss Winston, I assure you I did not harm that man,” I said. “Mrs. Carfax was mistaken.”

  “She made no mistake.” Miss Winston tried to shut the door again.

  I clung to it. “Let me speak to her.”

  “She don’t want to.”

  “Please, Miss Winston.” I heard the desperation in my voice. “The magistrate is ready to charge me for a crime I did not commit. Let me convince her I was nowhere near Grimpen Lane that night.”

  Miss Winston debated, her eyes narrowing, intelligence trying to overcome her fear. Something in me must have been persuasive, because she at last gave a nod. “Wait here.”

  I was reluctant to move my foot and let her shut the door, but I conceded, released the door handle, and backed a step. The door closed, but Miss Winston did not shoot the bolt. I heard her ascend the stairs inside, and after a time, voices raised above.

  The door was too thick for me to discern what was said, but after about a quarter of an hour, footsteps sounded again. Miss Winston opened the door then reached behind her and dragged an unhappy Mrs. Carfax outside with her.

  Mrs. Carfax was the plainer of the two women, her eyes like faded blue sky. She kept her head ducked, her shawl pulled tight, as though appalled Miss Winston had made her come out without a bonnet and concealing coat.

  “We should speak inside,” I said. “The day is too cold.”

  Miss Winston shook her head. “No, you must say your piece. She’ll not let you in.”

  I doubted anything male had entered their rooms in a decade. “Mrs. Carfax,” I said as gently as I could. “You could not have seen me here the night of Mr. Perry’s death. It was the fifth of January; do you remember? I was at home with Mrs. Lacey, packing to remove to Bath. I was in sight of my wife or her servants, or my daughter and my daughter’s aunt and uncle the entire evening. So you see, it could not have been me you saw.”

  Mrs. Carfax shot me a quick glance, blue eyes the only color in her face. “It was you, Captain. I know it.”

  “I take it you saw me from your window?” I asked, looking up at it.

  Mrs. Carfax pulled her shawl closer. “That is correct. From the window.”

  “Mrs. Carfax, in the years I’ve known you, you have always closed your curtains as soon as the daylight fades. You keep them closed until dawn, never varying. In winter, the darkness comes early, not much past four. How then, were your curtains open for you to look out at eight in the evening?”

  “I on occasion crack them open to look out into the street. Such as when I hear a noise.”

  She was lying. Her face was flushed, her gaze everywhere but on mine.

  “Have we not been neighbors and acquaintances for years?” I asked her. “You know that man wasn’t me, Mrs. Carfax. If you saw any man at all.”

  “It was you.” Mrs. Carfax’s voice grew more firm as the words came out. “I have told the magistrate.”

  I tried to speak patiently, but my words had an edge to them. “Has someone put you up to this? Told you to say these things? Mr. Spendlove, perhaps?”

  Her eyes flickered, but I could not tell if she feared the name of Spendlove or her fright came from me towering over her, demanding she answer.

  “If he has threatened you, I will stop him,” I said. “Forgive me for upsetting you, but I might be fighting for my life. I’ve only just gotten married.”

  I realized at that moment exactly how much I wanted a long, happy life with Donata. Wanted it, longed for it with everything in me. The preparations for the wedding, the ceremony, and the shortened wedding journey had all rather obscured the realization that I had done the deed.

  At this moment, in the street, cold wind cutting through me, my thoughts coalesced to one incandescent point—I had married my lover, a woman who’d challenged me from the moment I’d met her. I wanted to embrace every moment I had with her.

  Mrs. Carfax remained rigid, not looking at me, but Miss Winston softened a little. “The Runner, Mr. Spendlove, did question us. He had poor Henny in quite a state.”

  This was the first time I’d heard Mrs. Carfax’s Christian name, or at least her pet name. “Did he instruct you to tell the magistrates you’d seen me?”

  Mrs. Carfax broke away from Miss Winston. “I saw you, Captain. That is all.” She gathered her shawl about her and ran back inside the house, slamming the door behind her.

  Miss Winston remained with me, her look troubled.

  “I am correct, am I not?” I asked her. “Mr. Spendlove made her say these things.”

  “I believe so. Mr. Spendlove spoke to her in Mrs. Beltan’s parlor. He sent me out, quite forcibly, and shut the door. When he’d finished and emerged, Henny was pale and sick, and she had to be taken home and put to bed. She never would tell me what he’d said.”

  Spendlove had threatened her with something, that was certain. Whatever he’d said he’d do to her, I would stop him.

  “I know you did not kill that man, Captain,” Miss Winston said. “I will be prepared to say so if I must.”

  “You are kind,” I said. “If you can persuade Mrs. Carfax to change her mind . . .”

  “I will endeavor. Good night.” Miss Winston nodded to me then went back inside the house and closed the door.

  I was left alone with my basket of baked goods and the winter cold.

  I turned and walked across the lane again to the bakeshop, borrowed keys from Mrs. Beltan, because I’d left all mine behind in Bath, and opened the door to the stairwell that led to my rooms.

  The smell met me. The cold cut it a little, and the wind coming in behind me helped, but the stench of death lingered.

  I went slowly up the stairs and unlocked my front room. I stood in the doorway, the chill of the stairwell embracing me, and studied what was before me. John Perry’s body had been removed, but no one had bothered to clean the blood from the wooden floor. The blood had dried, the large brown stain a reminder of the violence that had occurred here.

  I held my breath against the smell as I crossed the room, avoiding the stains, and opened the front windows. Cleansing winter air poured in, bitterly cold.

  I searched my rooms, hoping to find something the Runners had missed. I was not optimistic—Pomeroy was thorough. I found no blood in the bedchamber; all in that room was as I’d left it. The struggle hadn’t come this far.

  I locked the door to my flat again when I departed, but I let the windows stand open. I wanted the stink gone, and I had nothing to steal.

  A large man waited for me at the street door. He had a deep scar on each cheek, his nose had been broken, and his eyes were watchful. He stood in front of me so I could not move around him, but he said nothing at all as I stopped on my doorstep.

  “Where is Mr. Brewster?” I asked. “I thought he was my minder.”

  This man was apparently not as talkative as Brewster. He stared at me, popped open his mouth, said, “Watching South Audley Street,” and popped his mouth closed again.

  “Was he here the night Mr. Perry was killed?”

  Again the stare then the little noise as he opened his mouth. “No one were here. Mr. Denis said to watch you and your family, not your rooms.”

  “Hmm.” I contemplated the darkening street. “And now you are watching me?”

  A nod. Very well. The man could watch me find a hackney to take me home. I was tempted to hand him the basket to carry for me, but I did not think he had a sense of humor.

  He still did not move. “His nibs wants to see that old biddy across from you.”

  I was not surprised to hear Denis had learned that Mrs. Carfax was Spendlove’s witness, because Denis had eyes everywhere. But I did not like Denis’s interest. “If you mean Mrs. Carfax, tell hi
s nibs to leave her alone.”

  The man only stared at me. I finally stepped around him, laid the keys back on Mrs. Beltan’s counter, and made my way out of Grimpen Lane. Denis’s man followed close on my heels.

  As I made to climb into the hackney coach at the stand in Russel Street, I had a bad thought. If Denis wanted Mrs. Carfax so adamantly, this man might take it upon himself to go to her the moment I rode away and drag her to Denis any way he could.

  “Get in,” I said to him. “Take me to see Mr. Denis.”

  The large man did not like this idea. I saw him think about it, his mean-looking eyes never leaving me. At last, he gave an abrupt nod, turned from me, and climbed onto the back of the coach.

  I pulled myself inside the best I could, and the carriage sprang forward. I hadn’t managed to close the door, and it swung on its hinges, banging against the latch but not catching. I reached for it, but a helpful citizen outside grabbed the door and slammed it shut as we rolled on into Covent Garden.

  Chapter Fifteen

  It was dark by the time I descended in Curzon Street. Denis’s man climbed down and disappeared inside the house, and the emotionless butler came out to help me from the hackney and inside. Again I had no appointment, but this time the butler put me into the elegant but unfriendly downstairs reception room while he went to tell Denis I’d arrived. I paced without sitting down.

  I waited about half an hour before the butler returned and ushered me to Denis’s private study. His desk this evening held a few large sheets of paper, which he perused without animation. One page I saw before he carefully turned it facedown contained the detailed drawing of a sculpture, a very old and rare sculpture I recognized from books. At present, the sculpture was in Rome. I wondered where it would end up. Because Denis would have had plenty of time to clear his desk before I entered, I knew he’d wanted me to see the page.

  Denis motioned me to a chair, which his butler had arranged in front of the desk. When I sat, the butler set a goblet of brandy on the small table next to the chair, the brandy positioned in the exact center of the table. The butler had done this before when I’d visited—I wondered how often he practiced the move.