‘I don’t know any Clarence Devereux.’
‘I believe you do.’
‘You’re mistaken.’
I’d had enough. ‘I know who you are, Edgar Mortlake,’ I said. ‘I have seen your record sheet. Bank burglary. Safe-cracking. A year in the Tombs for armed assault. And that was only the most recent of your convictions.’
‘You should be careful how you speak to me!’ Mortlake took a couple of paces towards me and his entourage circled him nervously, wondering what he was going to do. ‘That was all in the past,’ he snarled. ‘I’m in England now … an American citizen with a respectable enterprise, and it would seem that your job is to protect me, not to harass me.’ He nodded at the dead man. ‘A duty you have signally failed to carry out where my late partner was concerned. Where’s the woman?’
‘If you are referring to Henrietta, she is upstairs,’ Jones said. ‘She was also killed.’
‘And the rest of them?’
‘The entire household has been murdered.’
Mortlake seemed to be thrown for the first time. He took one last look at the blood and his lip curled in disgust. ‘There is nothing for me here,’ he said. ‘I will leave the two of you gentlemen to sniff around.’
Before anyone could stop him, he had swept out again, as brazenly as he had come in. The three hooligan boys closed in on him and I saw that their primary concern was to protect him, to provide a living wall between him and his enemies in the outside world.
‘Edgar Mortlake,’ I said. ‘The gang is making itself known.’
‘And that may be helpful to us.’ Jones glanced at the open door.
Mortlake had reached the bottom of the garden and passed through the gate. Even as we watched, he climbed into the carriage that was waiting for him, followed by his three protectors, and with the cracking of a whip he was off, back towards Highgate Hill. It occurred to me that if the murder of Scotchy Lavelle and his household had been designed to send a message then it was one that had most definitely been received.
EIGHT
Scotland Yard
If Hexam’s had anything to recommend it – and the list was not a long one – it was its close proximity to the centre of London. The breakfast room was once again empty and, after finishing my meal, I left the maid and the Boots behind me and set off, intending to follow the Embankment, something that Jones had recommended the day before.
The Thames was glistening on the other side of a long row of trees that graced the boulevard. There was a fresh spring breeze blowing and as I stepped out of the hotel, a black-hulled river steam ship chuffed past on its way to the Port of London. I stopped and watched it pass and it was at that moment that I had the strange feeling that I was being watched. It was still early and there were few people around: a woman, pushing a pram, a man in a bowler hat walking with a dog. I turned and looked back at the hotel. And it was then that I saw him, standing behind a window on the second floor, gazing out into the street. It took me only a second to work out that he occupied the room next to mine. This was the man whom I had heard coughing throughout the night. He was too far away – and the windows were too grimy – for me to see him clearly. He had dark hair and wore dark clothes. He was almost unnaturally still. It might have been my imagination but I would have said his eyes were fixed on me. Then he reached out with one hand and drew the curtain across. I tried to put him out of my mind and continued on my way. But I could no longer enjoy the walk as much as I had hoped. I was uneasy without knowing why.
Another fifteen minutes brought me to my destination. Scotland Yard, as it was already known (although in fact it was situated in Whitehall Place), was an impressive building that straddled the ground between Victoria Embankment and Westminster. It was also a pretty ugly one, or so it seemed to me as I crossed the boulevard and looked for the main entrance. It was as if the architect had changed his mind after construction had begun. Two floors of austere granite suddenly yielded to red and white brickwork, ornate casements and Flemish-style tourelles, giving the impression of two quite separate buildings squashed one on top of the other. There was something of a prison about the place too. Its four wings enclosed a courtyard barely touched by the sun. The inmates of Newgate would probably enjoy their exercise more than the unfortunate police officials penned up here.
Athelney Jones was waiting for me and raised a hand in greeting. ‘You got my message! Excellent. The meeting is to start very soon. It is quite remarkable. In all my time here, I would say it is almost unique. No fewer than fourteen of the most senior detective inspectors have come together in response to the Highgate murders. We won’t have it, Chase. It is simply beyond the pale.’
‘And I am to be permitted to attend?’
‘It wasn’t easy. I won’t pretend otherwise. Lestrade was against it – and Gregson too. I told you when we first met, there are many here who believe we should have no dealings with a commercial detective agency such as Pinkerton’s. In my view, it is foolish, this lack of co-operation when we have the same aims. Still, this time I have been able to persuade them of the importance of your presence. Come – we should go in.’
We climbed a set of wide steps and entered a hall where several uniformed constables stood behind tall desks, examining the letters of introduction and passports of those who wished to enter. Jones had already prepared the way for me and together we fought our way up a crowded staircase with uniformed men, clerks and messengers pushing past each other in both directions.
‘The building’s already too small for us,’ he complained. ‘And we have barely been here a year! They found a murdered woman in the basement during the construction.’
‘Who killed her?’
‘We don’t know. No one has any idea who she was or how she came to be there. Do you not find it strange, Chase, that the finest police force in Europe should have chosen to locate itself at the scene of an unsolved crime?’ We reached the third floor and passed a series of doors, evenly spaced. Jones nodded as we passed one of them. ‘My office. The best rooms have a view over the river.’
‘And yours?’
‘I look into the quadrangle.’ He smiled. ‘Perhaps when you and I get to the end of this business, they’ll think to move me. At least I am close to the records office and the telegraph room!’
We had passed an open door and, sure enough, there were about a dozen men dressed in dark suits, sitting at tables or along a high counter, crouched over their telegraph sets with papers and printed tape all around them.
‘How quickly can you contact America?’ I asked.
‘The actual message can be sent in a matter of minutes,’ Jones replied. ‘The printing takes a while longer and if there is too much traffic it can be days. Do you wish to communicate with your office?’
‘I should send them a report,’ I said. ‘They’ve heard nothing from me since I left.’
‘In truth, you’d do better to apply to the Central Telegraph Office in Newgate Street. You may find them more obliging.’
We continued through a set of doors and into a large, airless room, the windows recessed in such a way that they seemed to hold back the light. A vast table, curved at both ends, took up all the available space and seemed to have been fashioned not so much to bring people together as to keep them apart. I had never seen such a great expanse of polished wood. There were already nine or ten men in the room, one or two smoking pipes, talking amongst themselves in low voices. Their ages ranged, I would have said, from about twenty-five to about fifty. Their clothes were by no means uniform. Although the majority were smartly dressed in frock coats, one man wore a tweed suit while another presented himself in the unusual attire of a green pea-jacket and cravat.
It was this man who first saw us as we came in and strode hastily towards us as if about to make an arrest. My first impression was that it would be hard to imagine him as anything other than a police officer. He was lean and businesslike with dark, inquisitive eyes that examined me as if I – and everyone else h
e met – must surely have something to hide. His voice, when he spoke, had an edge to it that was almost deliberately unfriendly.
‘Well, well, Jones,’ he exclaimed. ‘I take it this is the gentleman of whom you spoke.’
‘I am Frederick Chase,’ I said, extending a hand.
He shook it briefly. ‘Lestrade,’ he said and his eyes glinted. ‘I would welcome you to our little gathering, Mr Chase, but I’m not sure welcome is the right word. These are queer times. This business at Bladeston House … very, very bad. I am not sure what it portends.’
‘I am here to give you any help I can,’ I said, heartily.
‘And who is it that most needs help, I wonder? Well, we shall see.’
Several more inspectors had entered the room and finally the door was closed. Jones gestured at me to sit next to him. ‘Say nothing for a while,’ he said, quietly. ‘And watch out for Lestrade and Gregson.’
‘Why?’
‘You cannot agree with one without antagonising the other. Youghal over there is a good man but he is still finding his feet. And next to him …’ He glanced at a man with a high-domed forehead and intense eyes who was sitting at the head of the table. Although he was not one of the most physically impressive men in the room, there was still something about him that suggested great inner strength. ‘Alec MacDonald. I believe him to have the best brain in the business and if anyone can steer this enquiry in the right direction, it is he.’
A large, breathless man lowered himself into the seat on the other side of me. He was wearing a frogged jacket which was stretched tight across his chest. ‘Bradstreet,’ he muttered.
‘Frederick Chase.’
‘Delighted.’ He took out an empty pipe and tapped it on the table in front of him.
Inspector Lestrade began the meeting with a natural authority that seemed to outrank the others in the room. ‘Gentlemen,’ he said. ‘Before we get down to the very serious business that brings us here today, it’s fitting that we pay our respects to a good friend and colleague whom we have recently lost. I refer, of course, to Mr Sherlock Holmes, who was known to many of us here and, by reputation, to the public at large. He helped me in no small way on one or two occasions, I will admit, starting with that business at Lauriston Gardens some years ago. It is true that he had a queer way about him, spinning those fine theories of his like gossamer out of thin air – and although some of it may have been no more than guesswork, none of us here would deny that he was often successful and I’m sure we’ll all miss him following his unfortunate demise at the Reichenbach Falls.’
‘Is there no chance that he could have survived?’ The speaker was young and smartly dressed, about halfway down the table. ‘After all, his body has never been found.’
‘That much is true, Forrester,’ Lestrade agreed. ‘But we have all read the letter.’
‘I was at that dreadful place,’ Jones said. ‘If he fought Moriarty and fell, I am afraid there is very little chance that he could have been saved.’
Lestrade shook his head solemnly. ‘I’ll admit that I’ve been wrong about one or two things in the past,’ he said. ‘Particularly where Sherlock Holmes was concerned. But this time I have looked at the evidence and I can tell you without any doubt at all that he is dead. I would stake my reputation on it.’
‘We should not pretend that the loss of Sherlock Holmes is anything short of a catastrophe,’ the man sitting opposite me said. He was tall with fair hair and as he spoke, Jones whispered to me, ‘Gregson.’ He continued: ‘You mentioned the Lauriston Gardens affair, Lestrade. Without Holmes, it would have gone nowhere. Why, you were about to search the whole of London for a girl called Rachel when in fact it was Rache, the German for revenge, that the victim had left as a final clue.’ There were quite a few smiles around the table at that and one or two of the detectives laughed out loud.
‘There is one silver lining to the cloud,’ Inspector Youghal said. ‘At least we’ll no longer find ourselves being caricatured by his associate, Dr Watson. I was of the view that his scribblings did our reputations no good at all.’
‘Holmes was a damned odd fellow,’ a fifth man exclaimed. As he spoke, he rubbed his eyeglass between finger and thumb as if he were adjusting it to better see the others in the room. ‘I worked with him, you know, on that business with the missing horse. Silver Blaze. A very strange individual. Sherlock Holmes, not the horse. He had a habit of speaking in riddles. Dogs that bark in the night, indeed! I admired him. I liked him. But I’m not at all sure I will miss him.’
‘I was always suspicious of his methods,’ Forrester concurred. ‘He made it all sound easy enough and we took him at his word. But is it really possible to tell a man’s age from his handwriting? Or his height from the length of his stride? Much of what he said was unsound, unscientific and occasionally preposterous. We believed him because he got results, but it was not a sound platform for modern detective work.’
‘He made fools of all of us,’ exclaimed yet another inspector. ‘It’s true that I also benefited on one occasion from his expertise. But is it not the case, perhaps, that we were becoming too dependent on Mr Holmes? Did we ever solve anything without him?’ He turned to the colleagues on his left and right. ‘As hard as it is and as ungrateful as it may sound, perhaps we should embrace his going as an opportunity for us to achieve results on our own two feet.’
‘Well said, Inspector Lanner.’ It was MacDonald who had spoken and now all eyes were on him. ‘I never met Mr Holmes myself,’ he continued in his thick Scottish accent. ‘But I think we are agreed that we owe him our thanks and our respect and it’s now time to move on. For better or for worse he has left us on our own and, having acknowledged as much, let us consider the matter at hand. He picked up a sheet of paper that had been lying in front of him and read from it. ‘Mr Scott Lavelle, tortured and his throat cut. Henrietta Barlowe, smothered. Peter Clayton, a petty criminal who was known to us, stabbed. Thomas Jerrold and Lucy Winters strangled. An entire household in a respectable suburb wiped out in the course of one night. We cannot have it, gentlemen. It cannot be allowed.’
Everyone in the room murmured their agreement.
‘And as I understand it, these are not the first atrocities that have taken place recently in Highgate. Lestrade?’
‘You are right. There was a death not one month ago, a young man by the name of Jonathan Pilgrim. Hands tied, shot in the head.’ Lestrade gazed at me as if I had been the one responsible and for a moment I felt the anger rise within me. I had been close to Pilgrim. It was his death, more than anything, which drove me on in my pursuit of Clarence Devereux. But I understood this was simply Lestrade’s manner. He meant nothing by it. ‘Pilgrim carried papers that showed him to be an American only recently arrived in the country,’ he continued. ‘He must have had an interest in Lavelle as his body was found only a short distance from Bladeston House.’
I felt it was time for me to speak out and so I did.
‘Pilgrim was investigating Clarence Devereux,’ I said. ‘I myself sent him to this country for that purpose. Devereux and Lavelle were working in collaboration and must have somehow discovered my agent. It was they who killed him.’
‘But in that case, who killed Lavelle?’ Bradstreet asked.
MacDonald held up a hand. ‘Mr Chase,’ he said, ‘we have been given a full explanation of your presence in London by Inspector Jones and I must say that it is only due to the exceptional circumstances of this case that you find yourself here today.’
‘I’m grateful for it.’
‘Well, you have him to thank. We will hear from you shortly. But it seems to me that if we are going to get to the bottom of these appalling murders, we need to go back to the very start … even to the Reichenbach Falls.’ He turned to an inspector who had not so far spoken. This was a slight, grey-haired individual who had been nervously picking his nails and who looked like someone who never wanted to be noticed. ‘Inspector Patterson,’ he said, ‘you were responsible for the a
pprehension of Moriarty’s gang. You helped to drive him abroad. I think you should share with us exactly what occurred.’
‘Certainly.’ Patterson did not look up as he spoke, as if his report were engraved in the tabletop. ‘You are all aware that Mr Holmes approached me last February although it had been his intention, I think, to meet with Lestrade.’
‘I was on another case,’ Lestrade explained with a scowl.
‘In Woking, I believe. Well, yes, in your absence, Mr Holmes came to me and asked for my co-operation in the identification and arrest of a gang that had been operating in London for some time – or so he said – and in particular, one man.’
‘Professor Moriarty,’ Jones muttered.
‘The very same. I have to say that at the time the name was unknown to me and when Holmes explained that he was famous throughout Europe for some theory he had devised and, moreover, that he had held the Chair of Mathematics at one of our most prestigious universities, I thought he was making fun of me. But he was of the utmost seriousness. He referred to Moriarty in the very darkest terms and went on to furnish me with evidence that could leave no doubt of what he said.
‘By the beginning of last month, assisted by Inspector Barton here, I had drawn together a schematic – you might say a map – of London that showed an extraordinary, interlinking network of criminality.’
‘With Moriarty at the centre,’ Barton added, puffing on his pipe.
‘Indeed. I might add that we were assisted by a great number of informers who suddenly chose to come forward. It was as if, sensing Moriarty’s weakness, they seized this moment to get their revenge, for there was no doubt that he had ruled by intimidation and threat. We received anonymous letters. Evidence of his past crimes – about which we had no knowledge whatsoever – suddenly came to light. Moriarty’s journey from obscurity to centre stage was a very short one and, at a given signal from Holmes, for he was most particular about the timing, we pounced. In the course of a single weekend, we made arrests in Holborn, Clerkenwell, Islington, Westminster and Piccadilly. We entered houses as far afield as Ruislip and Norbury. Men of the utmost respectability – teachers, stockbrokers, even an archdeacon – were taken into custody. On the Monday, I was able to telegraph Holmes who was by this time in Strasbourg and inform him that we had the entire gang.’