The smile grew wider. “Inspector Charles Frederick Field, either of the police Detective Bureau or of his own Private Enquiry Bureau, does not make threats, Mr Collins. But he will have the information he requires to carry on his battle with an old and implacable foe.”
“If this… Drood… has been your foe, as you put it, for almost two decades, Inspector, you hardly need our help. You must know much more about… your foe… than Dickens or I ever will.”
“Oh, yes, sir,” agreed Field. “I do. I would blush to say that I know more about the creature you call Drood than does any man now living. But Hatchery informs me that Mr Dickens has had recent contact with the entity. And out of Undertown. At the Staplehurst accident, to be precise. I need more information about that and about what the two of you saw in Undertown in July.”
“I thought the arrangement, or at least Detective Hatchery explained it as such, was for you police and private detectives to leave the denizens of Undertown alone as long as they continue to leave us surface dwellers to our own devices,” I said drily.
Field shook his head. “Drood don’t leave us alone,” he said softly. “I know for a fact that the creature has been responsible for more than three hundred murders in London alone since I first crossed his trail twenty years ago.”
“Good God,” I said. The shock was real. I felt it coursing through me like a full glass of laudanum.
The inspector nodded. “I need to have the information from your amateur search, Mr Collins.”
“You will have to ask Mr Dickens for any information,” I said stiffly. “It was his outing. Drood was of his interest. I assumed from the beginning that our ‘outing’— as you put it—with Detective Hatchery was part of some research that Dickens is doing for a future novel or story. I still assume that to be the case. But you will have to speak to him, Inspector.”
“I went to speak to him as soon as I returned to London after my long absence and heard from Hatchery the reason for Dickens having hired him,” said Field. He rose and began pacing, walking back and forth in front of my desk. His corpulent finger was first at his mouth, then to his ear, then alongside his nose, then touching the stone egg on my desk or the ivory tusk on my bookshelf or the Persian dagger on the mantel. “Mr Dickens was in France and unavailable. He has just returned and I interviewed him yesterday. He gave me no information of any use.”
“Well, Inspector…” I said, opening my hands. I set my cigar on the edge of the brass tray on my desk and rose. “You see then that there could be nothing I could add to help you. It was Mr Dickens’s research. It is Mr Dickens’s…”
He pointed at me. “Did you see Drood? Were you in his presence?”
I blinked. I remembered being awakened from my slumber on the subterranean brick wharf—my watch showed that it was twenty minutes after the sunrise above, after the time at which Hatchery had said he must leave—when Dickens returned in the flat-bottomed boat with the two tall and silent oarsmen. He had been gone for more than three hours. Despite the real danger, despite the real risk of being attacked and eaten by the wild boys, I had dozed off while sitting cross-legged there on the damp bricks, the loaded and cocked revolver still on my lap.
“I saw no one of Mr Drood’s alleged description,” I said stiffly. “And that is all the information I intend to impart on this subject, Inspector Field. As I said and shall repeat to you for the last time, it was Mr Dickens’s outing, his research, and if he chooses not to share the details of the evening, then I am, as a gentleman, bound to a corresponding silence. I wish you good day, Inspector, and also wish you good luck on your…”
I had come around the desk and opened the door for the ageing inspector, but Field had not budged from his place standing by my desk. He smoked the cigar, looked at it, and said quietly, “Do you know why Dickens was in France?”
“What?” I was sure that I had heard wrong.
“I said, Mr Collins, do you know why Charles Dickens was in France this week past?”
“I have no idea,” I said, voice almost brittle with irritation. “Gentlemen do not pry into other gentlemen’s travel or business arrangements.”
“No, indeed, they do not,” said Inspector Field and smiled again. “Dickens was in Boulogne for a few days. More specifically, he divided his time between Boulogne and the tiny village a few miles south of Boulogne, a place called Condette, where for some years, since 1860 to be precise, Mr Dickens has leased the former modest chalet and gardens of a certain Monsieur Beaucourt-Mutuel. This chalet in Condette has been the frequent residence of a certain actress, now twenty-five years of age, named Ellen Ternan, along with her mother. Charles Dickens has enjoyed their company at Condette—some of the visits have been up to a week in length—more than fifty times since he purportedly leased, although in truth purchased, the chalet in 1860. You may want to close the door, Mr Collins.”
I did so but remained standing by the closed door, thunderstruck. Counting Ellen Ternan, her mother, Dickens, and myself, there were no more than eight people in the world who had any hint of the chalet in Condette or the reason for Dickens’s many visits there. And were it not for my brother Charles’s being married into the Dickens household, I would never have learned about it myself.
Inspector Field resumed his pacing, his finger by his ear as though he were hearing facts whispered to him from the digit. “Miss Ternan and her mother live full-time in England, now, of course, since the Staplehurst accident in June. We can assume that Mr Dickens was winding up their affairs—and his own—at the chalet in Condette during his recent four days in Boulogne. To do this, Mr Dickens had to retrace—precisely— the same route that he took when the Staplehurst accident occurred. We both know, Mr Collins, that this could not have been easy on Mr Dickens’s nerves… which have not been strong since the accident.”
“No,” I said. What in the blazes did the man want?
“After his time in Boulogne,” continued the apparently indefatigable old man, “Dickens went on to Paris for a day or two. A more suspicious mind than mine might suggest that the Paris trip was to cover his tracks, as some detectives like to say.”
“Inspector Field, I do not believe that any of this is…”
“Not to interrupt, sir, but you should know—for future reference as you talk to your friend in the immediate days to come—that it was while in Paris that Mr Dickens suffered a brain haemorrhage of some apparent severity.”
“Dear God,” I said. “A brain haemorrhage. I’ve heard nothing about this. You are sure?”
“One cannot be certain of such things, as you know, sir. But Mr Dickens was struck down in Paris, was carried to his hotel room, and for some hours was quite insensible—incapable of either responding to his interlocutors or of speaking any words that made sense. The French doctors wished to have him in hospital, but Mr Dickens put it down to ‘sunstroke’—his phrase, sir—and merely rested one day in his Paris hotel and another two in Boulogne before returning home.”
I went back around the desk and collapsed into my chair. “What do you want, Inspector Field?”
He looked at me and his eyes widened with innocence. “I told you what I not only want, but require, Mr Collins. Any and all information that you and Charles Dickens have on this personage called Drood.”
I shook my head wearily. “You’ve come to the wrong man, Inspector. You shall have to return to Dickens to learn anything new about this phantom Drood. I know nothing at all that can help you.”
Field was nodding slowly. “I will indeed return to talk to Mr Dickens again, Mr Collins. But I have not come to the wrong man. I look forward to great cooperation from you in my Droodian enquiries. I fully expect you to get the information I need from Charles Dickens.”
I laughed a trifle bitterly. “And why would I betray a friend and his trust to funnel information to you, Inspector—by honourific only—Charles Frederick Field?”
He smiled at the thinly veiled insult. “The maid-servant who answered the door and show
ed me in, Mr Collins. She is very attractive, despite her age. Also a former actress, perhaps?”
Still smiling myself, I shook my head. “As far as I know, Inspector, Mrs G—— has no history whatsoever upon the stage. If she had, it would be none of my business, sir. Just as it is none of yours now.”
Field nodded and resumed his pacing, smoke trailing above and behind him, his finger back alongside his beak of a nose. “Absolutely true, sir. Absolutely true. But we can assume, nonetheless, that this is the same Mrs Caroline G—— whom you first started recording in your bank account as of 23 August, 1864—just a little more than a year ago, sir—as having received twenty pounds from you. Payments that you have made every month since then through your bank?”
I was weary of this. If this despicable little man was truly attempting to blackmail me, he had chosen the wrong writer. “What of it, Inspector? Employers pay their servants.”
“Indeed, sir. So I am told. And besides Mrs Caroline G——, her daughter, Harriet, I believe her name is—same name as your mother’s, sir, which is a pleasant coincidence—also receives payments from you through your bank, although in young Harriet’s case, and I believe you sometimes call her Carrie, and I believe she only recently turned fourteen years of age, sir, in young Harriet’s case the expenditures go towards her private education and music lessons.”
“Is there a point to this, Inspector?”
“Only that Mrs Caroline G—— and her daughter, Harriet G——, have been listed in city census and household tax records as having been both lodgers in your home and maid-servants in your employ for some years now.”
I said nothing.
Inspector Field quit pacing and looked at me. “All I am pointing out here, Mr Collins, is that few employers are so generous as to, first, employ former lodgers when times go hard for them and then to put one’s young maid-servant through a fine school, much less hire rather high-priced musicians to give them music lessons.”
I shook my head wearily. “You may abandon this sad attempt at ungentlemanly leverage, Mr Field. My domestic arrangements are known to all of my friends, as is my resistance to marriage and towards the more unimaginative versions of middle-class life and morals. Mrs G—— and her daughter have been my guests here for some years, as you well know, and my friends accept it. Caroline has been at my table helping me entertain for years now. There is no hypocrisy here, nor anything to hide.”
Field nodded, frowned, stubbed out what was left of his cigar, and said, “Your male friends, some of them, certainly do accept it, Mr Collins. Although you would agree that they do not bring their wives along when they dine at your table. And although there may not be any hypocrisy other than in your public records—in which you told city census officials that Mrs G—— was your servant and a certain ‘Harriet Montague’ was your maid-servant, age sixteen (even though Mrs G——’s daughter, Harriet G—— , here in your home, was only ten at the time)—and other sworn statements relating to these two worthy ladies, it does explain why Mr Dickens has referred to the child Harriet as ‘the Butler’ and to her mother as ‘the Landlord’ for several years now.”
This startled me. How could this man have known of Dickens’s small drolleries unless the retired inspector had men going through my most private correspondence?
“Harriet is not my daughter, Inspector,” I said through gritted teeth.
“Oh, no, of course not, Mr Collins,” said the old man, waving his finger and smiling. “I never meant to suggest such. Even the poorest detective would know that a certain Caroline Compton, daughter of the carpenter John Compton and his wife, Sarah, met and married a certain George Robert G——, an accountant’s clerk from Clerkenwell, and married him on… I do believe it was 30 March, 1850, sir. The young Caroline was just twenty years of age that year, George Robert G—— only a year older. Their daughter, Elizabeth Harriet, whom you prefer to call Harriet, sir, perhaps to honour your own mother, or Carrie, for reasons known only to yourself, was born in Somerset, on the outskirts of Bath, on 3 February, 1851. It’s sad that her father, George G——, came down with consumption the following year and died of it at the Moravian Cottages in Weston, near Bath, on 30 January, 1852, leaving his widow, Caroline, and twelve-month-old baby daughter, Elizabeth Harriet. Poor Mrs G—— came to the attention of authorities a few years later, when she was running a junk shop in Charlton Street—near Fitzroy Square, I’m sure you know, sir—and ran into difficulties paying her debts. It could have been a tragic tale, possibly including a debtors prison, Mr Collins, had it not been for the intervention of a gentleman. Probably in May of 1856.”
“Inspector Field,” I said, rising again, “our conversation here is over.” I moved towards the door again.
“Not quite over, sir,” he said softly.
I rounded on him, the fury obvious in my shaking voice and clenched fists. “I say to you, sir, do your worst. I challenge you. Your petty and dishonourable attempts to blackmail me into betraying the confidence and trust of one of my dearest friends will earn you nothing but the ridicule and disapprobation you so obviously deserve. I am a free man, sir. I have nothing to hide.”
Field nodded. His forefinger, which I had already learned to despise, was tapping at his lower lip. “I am sure that is true, Mr Collins. Honest men have nothing to hide from others.”
I opened the door. My hand was shaking on the brass of the handle.
“Tell me before I go, sir,” said Field, picking up his top hat and moving closer, “just for my own edification… have you ever heard of a girl by the name of Martha R——?”
“What?” I managed to say through a constricted throat.
“Miss Martha R——,” he repeated.
I closed the door so quickly that it slammed audibly. I had not seen Caroline lurking in the hallway, but she often stayed within earshot. I opened my mouth again but found no words.
That problem did not afflict the despicable Inspector Charles Frederick Field. “There’s no reason you should know Miss R——,” he said. “She’s a poor serving girl—domestic service and hostelry, to hear her poor parents tell of it, sir, and they are poor, both in finances and emotion these days. Both parents are illiterate. They’re from Winterton, sir. Her father’s male ancestors had served in the herring fleet out of Yarmouth for a century or more, but it seems that Martha’s father made do with other odd jobs around Winterton while Martha, who left home two years ago at the age of sixteen, worked in local hotels.”
I could only stare at Field and force down nausea.
“Do you know Winterton, sir?” asked the despicable man.
“No,” I managed. “I don’t believe I do.”
“Yet you took an extended holiday up Yarmouth’s way just a year ago this summer, is that not true, Mr Collins?”
“Not a holiday,” I said.
“What was that, sir? I could not quite understand you. The cigar smoke affecting your voice, perhaps?”
“It was not a holiday, as such,” I said and walked back to my desk but did not sit. Using all ten splayed and quavering fingers, I leaned forward and supported my weight against the top of that ink-splattered desk. “It was research,” I added.
“Research, sir? Oh… for one of your novels.”
“Yes,” I said. For my current novel, Armadale, I needed to research some coastal waters and landscapes and such.”
“Ah, yes… to be certain.” The despised man’s finger patted his own chest and then pointed towards mine. Patted, pointed. “I have read some of your book, this Armadale, which is currently being serialised in The Cornhill Magazine, if I am not mistaken. There is a fictional Hurle Mere in your tale that sounds very much like the real Horsey Mere, which can be reached by sea from Yarmouth or by taking a road north from Winterton, can it not, sir?”
I said nothing for a minute. Then I said, “I enjoy sailing, Inspector. My research was part holiday, after all, to tell the full truth. I went north with two good friends of my brother, Charles.… Th
ey also enjoy sailing.”
“I see.” The inspector nodded, his eyes moist and unreadable. “Telling the full truth is always a good idea, is my opinion. It avoids so many later problems if one starts with the full truth. Could those friends have been a Mr Edward Piggot and a Mr Charles Ward, sir?”
I was beyond surprise. This creature with the moist eyes and corpulent forefinger appeared to be more omniscient than any narrator in any tale written by me, by Dickens, by Chaucer, by Shakespeare, or by any other mortal writer. And more evil than any villain created by any of us, Iago included. I continued to lean on my desk as my splayed fingers turned white with pressure and I continued to listen.
“Miss Martha R—— turned eighteen last summer, Mr Collins. Her family believes that she met a man last year, last July to be precise, either at the Fisherman’s Return in Winterton itself or in the hotel in Yarmouth where she was then working as a maid.” He stopped. His forefinger tapped at the dead cigar in the brass tray as if his finger alone could breathe its embers back to life. I was almost surprised that it did not succeed.
I took a breath. “Are you telling me that this… this Miss R——… is missing, Inspector? Or murdered? Presumed dead by her family and the authorities in Winterton or Yarmouth?”
The man laughed. “Oh, bless me, no, sir. Not at all. Nothing like that. They’ve all seen young Martha, on and off, since she reported meeting this ‘nice gentleman’ last summer. But she has gone missing in a way, sir.”
“Oh?”
“Yes. This summer, this June to be precise, when the ‘nice gentleman’ appears by all accounts to have made yet another short trip to Yarmouth, perhaps as part of his work, Martha R—— seems to have disappeared for a while from Winterton and Yarmouth but, if such unofficial reports are to be believed, to have made an appearance here in London.”
“Really?” I said. I had never fired the huge two-barrelled pistol that Detective Hatchery had given me. After uncocking the massive thing, I had carried it up and out of the levels of sewers and catacombs with me and—in our tremendous relief in finding Hatchery waiting for us despite the late hour and obvious sunshine outside the crypt—given it back to the hulking detective. I wished now that I had kept the weapon.