by David Field
‘So where do I fit into all this, apart from years of experience of keeping royal offspring from blotting the family copybook?’
Ridley and Melville exchanged glances, and Ridley nodded, leaving the next part to Melville.
‘We have good reason to believe that certain — “interested parties”, shall we call them? — have begun to infiltrate and corrupt the Met.’
‘That’s nothing new,’ Percy pointed out, ‘and that’s a matter for you and the rest of Special Branch, surely?’
‘Ordinarily, yes,’ Melville conceded, ‘but we’ve got our hands full keeping an eye on the foreign elements. Added to which, we don’t want to alert the enemy that we’ve rumbled them by raising the hue and cry. What we need is a subtle internal enquiry.’
‘Me?’ Percy said with a cynical grin. ‘The loudmouth who just got himself officially sacked from the Met? I’m about as subtle as Big Ben.’
‘Precisely,’ Ridley intervened. ‘Remember what I told you earlier, in the garden, Percy? Half the Yard think of you as a potential troublemaker who doesn’t think twice about shitting in his own nest in order to bring about radical political reform.’
‘And how do you know I’m not?’ Percy challenged him, at which point Melville pulled back his jacket to reveal the revolver strapped across his waistcoat and smiled unpleasantly. ‘If you truly are, then there’s your answer. But we can use the fact that folk inside the Met think you are.’
‘How and why?’
‘Because,’ Ridley explained, ‘we’re hoping that those within the force who’ve thrown in their lot with those who we think are planning something for the Diamond Jubilee will approach you to join their team. If and when they do, then, like Millen before you, you pretend to go along with it and report back to Melville.’
‘And what evidence do we have that the Met’s been — “compromised” might be the appropriate word?’ Percy asked, and all eyes turned back to Ridley.
‘You will of course be aware that last week a considerable quantity of valuable gems were stolen from a Hatton Garden dealer in a brazen robbery involving explosives, during the course of which the nightwatchman was horribly murdered?’
‘Of course,’ Percy replied. ‘It was all over the newspapers.’
‘What was not all over the newspapers,’ Ridley continued, ‘was the fact that they seem to have gained entry to the premises by fooling the nightwatchman into letting them in because they were wearing police uniforms. Several local residents who heard the noise of the strongroom being dynamited have informed us that they saw men dressed as police constables running out of the premises carrying what were almost certainly bags of valuable stones and throwing them into what looked suspiciously like a Black Maria.’
‘That’s pretty serious,’ Percy observed unnecessarily, ‘since it suggests that either they were actual serving police officers, or they had access to the uniforms and coach.’
‘Either way, a serious “compromise”, as you would call it, of the integrity of the local Division. And it’s by no means the only incident recently that has led to the horrible suspicion that Met officers have been suborned.’
‘Go on?’ Percy invited him, and it was Melville who obliged.
‘The week before that, there was a break-in at a warehouse in Wapping that was being rented by the War Office to store Army uniforms destined for the Sudan. We have no idea if anything was stolen, although we’re now alert to the fact that there may be Anarchists walking the streets of London disguised as soldiers. The significance of the break-in was more the fact that whoever was responsible set fire to the place. Thousands of uniforms went up in smoke, and you could see the blaze several miles away in Bow.’
‘Again, a serious and brazen outrage against authority,’ Percy agreed.
‘But you haven’t heard the worst part yet,’ Melville advised him. ‘The warehouse in question was located directly behind a fixed beat point for the local force. There should have been a constable on duty right outside the place, but for some reason he was not at his post.’
‘Has he been questioned?’
Melville smiled unpleasantly. ‘Clearly he will be — once we can find him, and if he’s still alive.’
‘But killing a beat constable in order to effect a break-in, tragic and appalling as it is, isn’t unusual for that type of offence,’ Percy objected, to a responding frown from Ridley.
‘Break-ins are normally for the purpose of stealing something valuable. Our concern is that we may now have malcontents out to assassinate Her Majesty with access to military uniforms. There’s also the defiant public gesture that such outrages can occur under our very noses, not to mention the possible corruption or murder of a police constable.’
‘Presumably these two are not isolated incidents?’
Melville shook his head. ‘How many more do you need? Name your police division.’
‘Stepney,’ Percy replied to the challenge, and Melville extracted a list from his inside jacket pocket and began reading.
‘“Stepney, Seventeenth of August of this year, ten thirty am. Acting on complaints from neighbours regarding suspicious comings and goings at a terraced house in Ellerdale Street, Constables Greenway and Padley gained entry by force and located a substantial quantity of firearms. The occupier of the said house, Nathaniel Hiscock, was taken into custody, and officers from the Robbery Squad took possession of what had been discovered in the house.” End of police report.’
‘So?’
‘So,’ Melville replied, ‘three days later the man Hiscock had mysteriously escaped from his cell, and some eighty military rifles were unaccounted for in the vault to which they had been consigned inside the Yard.’
‘Let’s assume for the moment that these are not just a series of unfortunate and coincidental examples of police incompetence,’ Percy suggested, ‘your explanation for them is that someone is corrupting officers within the Met?’
Melville nodded, adding sarcastically, ‘They told me you were quick on the uptake.’
‘And you believe that if I simply resume my duties, someone will approach me and try the same thing?’
‘That’s what we hope,’ Ridley advised him, ‘given that you are rumoured to treat the Metropolitan Police Procedures Manual as if it were a book of helpful suggestions in doubtful cases. But we’ll obviously need to justify your reinstatement, after your somewhat dramatic departure, so we’re sending you back into the “Political Branch” with the ostensible special duty of liaising with Superintendent Melville on police readiness for the Diamond Jubilee security operation. Your Chief Superintendent Bray won’t be told your real role and will be advised from a very great height inside the Yard that he’s not to express any dissatisfaction with your reinstatement, is not to interfere with your duties, and in fact is to keep completely out of your face at all times.’
‘And I just sit there, collect my pay and await any approaches from the baddies?’ Percy said disbelievingly.
‘Not entirely,’ Melville corrected him. ‘We also require you to instigate subtle enquiries into how, if our suspicions are correct, various officers within the Met came to be corrupted. Perhaps the best way might be to send in another officer of Sergeant rank who’s ostensibly conducting a routine review of manpower and operational efficiency. Preferably someone from outside the Met, although we appreciate that this may not be possible, because it has to be someone you trust implicitly, whose integrity is beyond question.’
Ridley smiled. ‘I’m prepared, at this point, to lay a wager of a hundred pounds on the prospect that Enright here comes up with the perfect candidate without the need for any further thought, and that his name’s also Enright. Anyone care to take me on?’
‘Don’t either of you waste your money.’ Percy grinned as he looked across at Ridley.
‘You really do have an efficient intelligence network, don’t you?’
Ridley inclined his head in recognition of the compliment and turned to advise the other two
. ‘Detective Sergeant Jackson Enright is currently the head of what passes for the Detective Branch of the Essex Constabulary. Prior to that he was attached to the Yard, and while on uniformed divisional duties he gained extensive experience in the East End — precisely where most of these incidents appear to be occurring. He’s still quite young, but experienced and ambitious, while possessing a commanding physical presence. He’s of exactly the right rank and experience to be conducting routine reviews of operational efficiency within local police stations. His integrity has never been doubted, and he comes with the final advantage that he’s the nephew of Inspector Enright here.’
‘Sounds like the man we need, but will he agree?’ Melville asked.
Percy smiled. ‘He most certainly would, but no-one’s asked me yet if I’ll agree to all this.’
It fell briefly silent, until Melville muttered, ‘After what we’ve revealed to you this morning? Present arms!’, and in a well-choreographed move he and Reilly drew back their jackets to reveal their Webley revolvers. Percy smiled laconically.
‘That would seem to be decided, then.’
‘So glad you could join us,’ Ridley grinned as he sat back in his chair. ‘Now, anyone for apple pie?’
Once the coffee and port had been served, Ridley looked across at Percy.
‘There’s just one thing more you have to learn about the operation you’ve agreed to become a part of.’ When Percy raised his eyebrows above his port glass, Ridley nodded to Melville, who took over.
‘The Diamond Jubilee celebrations next June will be attended by the invited heads of all the Imperial nations; Canada, India, Australia, New Zealand and so on. The Queen needed no persuasion, because that used up all the diplomatic accommodation in London, not to mention all the seats at the official ceremonies, thereby excluding awkward members of her own extended family from just about everywhere in Europe.’
‘Didn’t that rather increase the risk of a foreign assassin?’ Percy asked.
Melville shook his head. ‘No, it considerably reduced it, since we believe that the greatest risk comes from one of her own relatives.’
Percy’s face expressed his shock and disbelief, and Melville availed himself of the silence to explain.
‘Thanks to the strength of our dear Queen’s affection for Albert in her younger years, there’s hardly a throne inside Europe that’s not graced with the backside of one of her remote relatives, some more remote than others. But that’s also given us massive headaches in Special Branch, since not all of those nations are necessarily friendly towards ours. Take Russia, for example, where the Tsar is grappling with a revolutionary groundswell of peasant resentment against the old Romanov regime. His wife, the Tsarina and Empress Alexandra, is Victoria’s granddaughter, and has secretly written to her grandmother for assistance from Britain should there be any attempt to overthrow the monarchy. This fact is generally known in revolutionary circles, and we believe that there may be an initiative from Russian dissidents here in England to forestall that possibility by assassinating the Queen. For that reason, it was not deemed appropriate to invite Tsar Nicholas to London, where he might be assassinated at the same time.’
‘But that’s by no means the end of the possibilities?’ Percy prompted him, and Melville shook his head.
‘By no means. Other grandchildren are either already occupying, or destined to occupy, the thrones of Greece, Norway, Romania and Sweden. And that’s not all of them. But you could appreciate how a well-placed bomb at the right time, for example during a photographic tableau of half the royalty of Europe on the steps of Osborne House, might cause sufficient chaos in Europe to allow revolutionaries to take over in the vacuum of power thereby created.’
‘You haven’t mentioned Germany,’ Percy reminded him. ‘Aren’t we currently engaged in diplomatic squabbles with them?’
‘On the surface, certainly,’ Melville confirmed, ‘but it goes deeper than that, and the reason why I’ve left Germany until last is because it’s the one we’re most apprehensive of.’
‘For what reason, if I’m allowed to know?’
Melville looked towards Ridley for permission to continue, and Ridley nodded.
‘As everyone knows,’ Melville recounted, ‘the current Emperor of Germany, and for that matter King of Prussia, is Wilhelm, grandson of our Queen. On the surface he enjoys a good relationship with her and is constantly craving her good opinion. But the reason for that is the fact that the rest of his European relatives regard him as a pompous idiot, a bloated buffoon, with a dangerous and unstable personality. That personality stems from a difficult birth that left him with a slightly withered left arm, and for which he blames his mother, Queen Victoria’s daughter of the same name. Wilhelm regarded his father as a weakling and grew up cosseted and surrounded by flatterers who gave him an inflated sense of his importance in the world, towards which he displays a warlike and aggressive face while entertaining excruciating self-doubts that are fed by the scorn of his cousins, who include our own Prince George. He also detests his uncle, our heir apparent Prince Edward.’
‘So he’s unstable, and to be avoided at all costs,’ Percy observed, ‘but how does that make him dangerous to England?’
‘The constant contempt and belittling from his European cousins has bred in him an almost insane desire to prove himself as the greatest ruler in Europe — a sort of reincarnation of Charlemagne or Barbarossa. For a long time he was held in check by his Chancellor, von Bismarck, who is, from Britain’s perspective, the best adviser we could have wished for, and who is constantly advocating peace and diplomacy with the other nations of Europe. But given his social awkwardness, his low self-esteem and his grandiose plans for European domination, Wilhelm will have none of it, and he ignores and decries Bismarck, who is on record as having summarised the Kaiser’s personality as that of someone “who wishes every day to be his birthday”.
‘I’m still not getting the picture,’ Percy complained, and Melville treated him to a look of sarcastic sympathy.
‘The man is dangerously unstable, wishes to rule half the world, has cast aside all wise and diplomatic counsel, wishes to declare war on Russia because he’s been snubbed by its Emperor, and hates the heir apparent of England with a passion. In short, a bomb waiting to explode, and a man who hasn’t received the invitation to the forthcoming Jubilee celebrations to which he thinks he’s entitled, when others such as the Prime Minister of New Zealand and the Maharaja of Kashmir have been. The brutal truth is that Wilhelm only has himself to blame for the exclusion of all the royal grandchildren, because of his volatile manner when amongst them. Her Majesty loves him dearly, but she doesn’t want him to repeat behaviour such as that when he was a child, and he bit the leg of the uncle who will shortly become Edward VII.’
‘So he’s resentful, and I can’t say I blame him,’ Percy observed, ‘but why does that make him dangerous?’
‘He’d like nothing better than to see England reduced to a robber baron state. He loves his grandmother, but hates the rest of the English royal family, and resents England’s pre-eminence in the world. He raised his true colours up the mast at the very start of this year, when he sent a congratulatory, and very well publicised, telegram to Paul Kruger after the failure of the Jamieson Raid on the Transvaal.’
‘But wouldn’t a bomb during the celebrations put paid to his beloved granny?’ Percy argued.
Melville smiled condescendingly. ‘You are presupposing sanity and a logical thought process in the mind of the person commissioning that bomb, are you not?’
‘I can see that I’m going to be well out of my depth in certain aspects of all this,’ Percy said, to which Melville replied tersely, ‘A very good reason for sticking to your part of the arrangement, and not venturing onto my turf.’
In case Percy had in some way been dissuaded against continuing what he had been persuaded to undertake, Ridley had one last card to play.
‘We must, with some regret, call this meeting to a clos
e, since I have to be in the House by five pm. However, before you go, Percy, you remember that I promised you a bribe?’
‘Wasn’t that a return to my normal duties and salary?’
‘No, they were what I called your “reward”. Your “bribe” takes the form of a reprieve for those two ladies on whose behalf you made such a fuss at the Bailey several weeks ago.’
‘Harriet Crouch and Amy Jackson? I thought that the crusty old judge declined to recommend clemency?’
‘So he did, but that’s not necessarily the end of such things. As we do in most cases in which the death penalty has been imposed, the Home Office has received a petition for mercy in both their cases, with over five thousand signatures. It came to me in accordance with normal practice, since I chair the committee that meets to consider all such petitions. It’s popularly known as “The Hanging Committee”, and it’s never once disagreed with me. It meets on Thursday of this week, and I propose to urge a reprieve for both of them.’
‘Simply because I agreed to play your games?’ Percy said cynically.
‘Let’s just say that I was inspired by your oratory in court.’ Ridley smiled.
It was beginning to get dark when the coach deposited Percy at his front door, from which Beattie emerged in her apron and rushed down the path to fling herself at her husband.
‘Thank God you’re safe! I’ve been worried sick, and I didn’t for one moment believe you when you said that the Home Secretary had sent his coach for you. You’re a rotten liar, Percy Enright, but I love you deeply and genuinely, and I’ve spent the entire afternoon wondering how I could possibly live without you. Come inside and have some tea — you must be starving!’
‘Not really,’ Percy grinned, ‘but it’s not been such a bad old day. I’ve had dinner with the Home Secretary, I’ve got my old job back, and Harriet Crouch and Amy Jackson have been spared the gallows. I wonder if I’ve still got time to put a bet on a horse?’