by David Field
THE JUBILEE PLOT
Esther and Jack Enright Mystery
Book Seven
David Field
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
A NOTE TO THE READER
MORE BOOKS BY DAVID FIELD
Chapter One
‘Before you pass sentence, my Lord, Detective Inspector Enright — the officer who investigated this case — wishes to be heard in the matter of clemency.’
Mr Justice Harrington raised both eyebrows as defence counsel Marshall Hall sat down, having had little to do except explain the reasons why his clients Harriet Crouch and Amy Jackson had killed the infants they had just pleaded guilty to having murdered.
‘This is highly unusual, is it not?’ the judge enquired of Marshall Hall. ‘I’ve listened carefully to what you’ve had to say in mitigation of the sentence of your clients, and I take into account their pleas of guilty and expressions of remorse, both of which were delivered with your customary command over the English language. And yet now I’m being required to hear — from the defence end of the bar table, I assume — something further in their favour from the very man whose tireless and unceasing efforts brought these two murderous wretches to justice?’
‘Indeed, your Lordship,’ Hall confirmed as he rose for long enough to address the Bench, then sat down again heavily when the varicose vein in his leg protested at the new imposition being placed upon it.
‘Very well,’ the judge agreed, ‘I’ll hear from this witness, although there would seem to me to be but one possible disposal available to me, after what I was informed by Treasury Counsel. Inspector Enright, what can you possibly have to add, and what could possibly deflect me from the death penalty in this case?’
Having taken the witness oath, Percy cleared his throat, looked defiantly up and across at his Lordship, and began. ‘Your Lordship, as you have been advised, it was my grim duty to investigate the series of deaths of young babies that led to these two ladies being arrested and brought before the Court, where they pleaded guilty as charged. They made no secret of the fact that between them they were directly responsible for the murders of ten helpless infants, and during my very first interviews with each of them they explained their reasons.’
‘None of those reasons constituting a defence to charges of Murder, I take it?’ the judge enquired.
Percy shook his head. ‘Not “defences” in the legal sense, no your Lordship, which is why — on the advice of their counsel Mr Hall — they pleaded guilty. But before your Lordship passes sentence, I feel that it is imperative that you learn of the circumstances that led to these deaths, terrible though they are in the perception of those of us who are fortunate to have led comfortable lives without fear of hunger, without being abused by others, and without the stigma of being the unwanted produce of others.’
‘You’re about to employ the word “orphan”, Inspector?’ the judge demanded with arched eyebrows. ‘If so, let me save you some breath. If I were to employ leniency in every case in which a miserable miscreant stood before me seeking to escape the hangman by claiming orphan status, we could use the gallows for firewood, and could convert Newgate into yet another Methodist chapel.’
‘If your Lordship would hear me out,’ Percy replied slightly testily, ‘I merely refer to the orphan status of these two ladies as a convenient label to attach to the means by which they ceased to have any protection from the law, ceased to lead lives that were deemed to be of any value to those entrusted with their welfare, and indeed ceased to qualify for the most basic human entitlements of life, liberty and personal integrity.’
‘A very strong claim, Inspector,’ the judge replied with a frown, ‘but what significance can it have in relation to the clear duty that confronts me? If their lives have been so miserable, why would they wish to prolong them?’
Percy went bright red as he fought with his anger. ‘If you will forgive me, your Lordship, that perception of the cheapness of human life when it is led by those on the very bottom-most rung of our social ladder is precisely what has led to the appearance of these ladies before you, and precisely explains why they, in their turn, sought to mercifully end the lives of others before they could be led with such misery as they themselves had endured. The system has failed Harriet Crouch and Amy Jackson, my Lord, and it cannot now be allowed to sweep them away in order to prevent the public scandal that must be exposed through what they can attest to regarding what was done to them.’
‘Do you speak as one of these Reformists, Inspector?’ the judge said in an irritated tone.
‘No, your Lordship, I speak as a committed Christian who joined the police service in order to protect the lives of those weaker than myself. To do my best to ensure that those living God-fearing lives in this society of ours could so without fear of the Devil in their midst.’
‘Before this degenerates into a sermon, Inspector, you might wish to elaborate on what experiences can possibly have converted two women from what should have been their natural instinct to nurture infants into a wicked determination to do away with those left in their care. Then you might go on to explain to me why this should prevent their being hanged.’
‘Certainly, your Lordship,’ Percy continued as he raised his voice for the benefit of the newspaper reporters.
‘Harriet Crouch and Amy Jackson were born in human bondage,’ Percy explained as pencils passed hastily across notebooks, ‘in the sense that they have no memory of mothers’ arms, no memory of warm nourishing milk, and no memory of smiling faces looking down on them. Their memories came to consist of the gnawing and persistent sensation of slow starvation, interspersed with seemingly purposeless beatings — certainly beatings for which they can recall no cause on their part.’
‘They were treated coldly and institutionally,’ the judge interrupted, ‘but that makes them no different from a thousand others like them. Proceed to something relevant, Inspector — and without any further displays of journalistic excess.’
‘It has to be hoped,’ Percy replied angrily, ‘that daily — sometimes hourly — rape and sodomy are not also the recommended and authorised routine of our orphanages, for that is what they each suffered when, at an approximate age of eight, these two women were transferred to the so-called “Children’s Ward” of the local Workhouse. In Harriet Crouch’s case it was for stealing the food that her starving body craved, while Amy Jackson’s sin would seem to have been sharing that stolen food with Harriet Crouch. They had already formed the sort of lifelong bond that can be forged only in the fire of utter despair and hopelessness, when any hand stretched out in friendship seems like a lifebelt. Since I can only assume,’ Percy proceeded in a voice chilled like slaughterhouse ice, ‘that Miss Crouch and Miss Jackson are the only persons present in this room who know what it’s like to be treated as a sexual spittoon by every deviant who’s sought employment in the Workhouse solely in order to be able to live out their sick fantasies on those in no position to make any formal complaint, then I won’t even attempt to elaborate, except to invite your Lordship to imagine what it must do to one’s self-esteem. For the re
st of us, who enjoy our freedom, our rights under the law, there’s always the comforting thought that if we are abused there is someone to whom we can complain, even if it is only to the police, who in many cases will fail in their half-hearted efforts to locate the culprit and bring him to justice.’
‘The police force that you represent?’ the judge reminded him.
Percy shrugged his shoulders. ‘Probably not for much longer, my Lord, since this case has brought home to me, more than any other that I’ve handled in a period of service exceeding thirty years, that I’ve been wasting my time. I could have done nothing to prevent what these women endured, since there was no-one to whom they could turn.’
‘When do you intend to get to the part which justifies what these women did to innocent babies, Inspector?’
‘Clearly, it cannot be justified, my Lord, but it is my submission to you that the deaths of the ten infants, which have been described to us in horrifying detail by Counsel for the Crown, while they were at the hands of Harriet Crouch and Amy Jackson, should be attributed to an institutional failure of which we, as Englishmen, should be thoroughly ashamed. The moral blame for all those deaths must lie with our so-called charitable institutions, which created the women who stand before you. Those who generated in these two women such a fearful dread of what lay in store for any child that had the misfortune to be locked away behind the grim walls of these Halls of Evil that they chose, as an act of mercy, to end the lives of those children for whom they could find no alternative in the form of adoption.’
‘And you suggest to me that society should express its guilt by way of a recommendation for clemency on my part?’ the judge asked with evident amusement.
‘It most certainly should not be allowed to hide its shame for what it has created in these two women by dropping them through a trapdoor on the end of a rope, then burying them in a pit of lime.’
‘Do you have anything further to add?’ the judge said testily as his hand reached for the black cloth.
Percy shook his head with sadness. ‘No, your Lordship.’
‘Very well, you may stand down from the witness box, since I’ve heard nothing to justify clemency in this case. Stand up, prisoners.’
Percy hung his head as he heard the all too familiar words of the death sentence being intoned without any indication of emotion or regret. He allowed himself a brief look at the faces of the two women. Harriet Crouch smiled.
‘You’re a good man, Percy Enright. Don’t give up the fight.’
Percy caught the meaningful look on the face of the court usher who was waiting to lock the courtroom doors at the end of what, to him, had simply been another working day. But for Percy Enright it was a very significant day. It was the day on which he would go home and write out his letter of resignation. Thirty odd years defending the indefensible. Thirty odd years believing that he was somehow doing his bit to improve the society to which he was dedicated. During that time he’d been shot, knifed, kicked, spat on and punched. He’d been offered bribes, and his life had been threatened countless times. He’d returned home soaking wet, uniform torn from his back, boots covered in victims’ blood, and utterly despondent. But he’d never given up. Until now.
For thirty odd years he’d apparently been wasting his time.
Chapter Two
‘Uncle Percy’s all over the morning paper!’ Esther Enright told Jack excitedly as he threw his hat at the hook on the back of the scullery door and missed as usual.
It was the front page ‘lead’ story in that day’s Daily Mail, which Esther would collect from the Post Office every morning on her return from accompanying their eldest daughter Lily to school. In two weeks time she’d also be handing over their second child Bertie, and not before time, given the restless boredom that caused him to be hyperactive and almost beyond Nell’s control as she tried to keep him occupied while Esther took care of the two youngest. Miriam was now eighteen months old and staggering around on two wobbly legs like a drunken navvy on pay night, while recently born ‘Thomas Percival’ required a feed every three hours if he was to be prevented from bawling the house down.
Jack’s mouth gaped open as he read the detailed report of what Percy had said in open court during the sentencing of Harriet Crouch and Amy Jackson at the Old Bailey the previous afternoon. He’d never known his uncle to be so eloquent but unfortunately it almost certainly meant the end of Percy’s career as a police officer, a career that Jack had been sharing for the past ten or so years. Now a Detective Sergeant in the local Essex force, and based in its Chelmsford headquarters, Jack had joined the Metropolitan Police with both the encouragement and support of the uncle who’d taken over his upbringing when Jack’s father Thomas had died shortly after Jack’s fourteenth birthday. By then Uncle Percy had been drafted into Scotland Yard, the elite detective force that handled all the Met’s more difficult cases, leaving uniformed constables like Jack to maintain the peace in ‘lively’ areas such as Jack’s first posting, Whitechapel.
Even when Jack had moved out to Essex, where he was now a Detective Sergeant at the head of a detective force of precisely three, himself included, Percy had somehow found ways of involving, in the most complex and potentially deadly investigations, both himself and Esther.
Jack put down the newspaper article and looked up at Esther.
‘So what did you think?’ she asked eagerly. ‘He was rather outspoken, wasn’t he?’
‘That’s rather like saying that the Queen’s a little on the plump side,’ Jack replied. ‘At least he won’t experience any more indecision about resigning after this.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Did you read what he said?’
‘Only briefly, since I had to supervise Nell black-leading the fireplace in the sitting room, and Bertie was being a perfect pest as usual. Your uncle seemed to be criticising the orphanages and Workhouses for their lack of effective supervision of what goes on in there. That’s nothing new, surely?’
‘Not to people like us, in the know,’ Jack reminded her. ‘But the vast majority of the reading public want to rest assured that these orphanages are well supervised, and not likely to trouble their consciences. As long as what goes on in there remains a secret, and they don’t actually have to look at, or even read about, what really happens to orphans, then Mr and Mrs Average are happy to remain ignorant. Uncle Percy certainly ruffled a few middle-class feathers there, at a guess.’
‘But why will that affect his decision about whether or not to resign?’
‘Because the decision will be taken out of his hands. Put another way, he’ll be thrown out of the Met.’
‘For speaking the truth?’
‘Of course. The popular thinking inside the Met is that the public must be reassured at all costs that we have all the nastiness suppressed, buried, and out of sight, so that they can lead their self-satisfied lives without fear. Uncle Percy just announced that there are horror stories bubbling under the surface, and that we’re losing the ability to hold the lid down.’
‘Don’t you think that’s a bit of an exaggeration, Jack?’
‘Is it? Have you forgotten how the East End reacted when the Ripper was doing his nightly rounds, and we seemed powerless to stop him? Don’t you remember the vigilante groups, the outraged letters to the newspapers, the near lynchings of anyone who even vaguely resembled the bogey man of their nightmares?’
‘Come to think of it, I had my own ‘bogey man’ experience the other day. I’m sure I was being followed,’ Esther said thoughtfully.
‘Followed by whom? And where?’
‘It’s probably nothing but my imagination,’ she offered, realising at the same time that this would not stop the questions.
‘Tell me what you imagined, then,’ Jack countered, and she relented.
‘Well, I was taking Lily to school the other day — Monday, it would have been — when I noticed this man standing under that large elm tree further down Bunting Lane, looking back up at the
house. As I walked down the lane he seemed to be walking about a hundred yards behind me, always keeping well back, but always the same distance away. Then when I came out of the school he was there again, a few yards on the other side of the school. I was a bit nervous by this stage, so I ducked into the Post Office and pointed him out to Mr Duckworth. He told me that the same man had been in the Post Office the previous week, enquiring if there was anyone called “Jacobs” living in Barking. The only person he knew of that name was old Mrs Sybil Jacobs, the retired schoolmistress, and then the man asked if anyone had moved into Barking lately with mail being delivered from a forwarding address in Clerkenwell. Ted Duckworth told him no, although he obviously knew about us. But something about the man gave Ted the creeps, and that’s why he hadn’t alerted me to the man’s enquiries. He fully intended to tell you about the man, since you’re a police officer and you’d be able to sort him out.’
‘And so I will,’ Jack muttered with a darkened face. ‘Nobody’s going to spy on my wife and daughter with impunity. I’ll stay home tomorrow and wait for him to lurk down the street. You can point him out, then I’ll demand to know his business.’
‘He’ll probably stay away if he knows you’re home,’ Esther pointed out, and after a moment’s reflection Jack nodded.
‘You’re probably right. Added to which, I’m up to my armpits in paper at work at the moment. But I’ll send young Billy Manvers down here to keep an eye on you and Lily, and perhaps warn the man off. He doesn’t sound like your usual lurker — it’s almost as if he’s looking for you specifically.’
‘You saved me the trouble of sacking you,’ Chief Superintendent Bray glared at Percy as he threw the envelope down on the desk in front of him. ‘That is your resignation, I assume?’
‘Naturally,’ Percy growled, and the ensuing silence was uncomfortable for them both. Finally it was Bray who broke it.
‘What were you thinking of, man? You only had three years left for a full pension retirement, and now you’ll get only half. What in God’s name got into your head?’