by Howard Engel
After some pleasantries and reminiscences of our days in medical school, I got quickly to the point of my visit. “Was Mlle Clery involved with anyone apart from poor Gordon Eward? Did she have an older and richer patron?”
“I didn’t know her well, Artie, although I would have liked to: she was a bonnie bit, y’know.” I gritted my teeth together when I heard him call me by that puerile diminutive, but kept listening. “Hew M’Chesney, over there, would be better to talk to. They say he cried at the news of her murder.” Jasper made the necessary introductions and I repeated my questions to a big man with a face as large and as red as a kerchief and with wee, pale blue eyes that did not quite belong.
“She wass a lady first and always an artist in efferything,” he said. “In France and other places, she had a string of stage-door-Johnnys, some of them fery well fixed, you know: toffs from Charlotte Square, viscounts and the Honourable this and the Honourable that. She lived with a writer once, a poet, in the rue Scribe in Paris, but that was to get him to finish the opera he promised to write for her. But when she met wee Gordie, down in Menton, efferything changed. You see, Gordie knew his music. She said that Gordie had the face a Gounod should write for. No, sir, after she met Gordie, there were no more successful followers and no more stage-door-Johnnys.”
“And Hew would know if she did. There are no well-kept secrets in an opera company,” assured my old university friend. I nodded my thanks and began to turn away; the beer having robbed me of half my list of questions.
“Hew, you dinna mention Cabezon.”
“What’s he to the purpose?”
“Let Artie decide. Mario Cabezon is a singing teacher. He gives lessons in Dewar Place. Mlle Clery studied with him in Milan.” I made note of the name to be polite, but I couldn’t see our chase moving in that direction at this late date.
“When would that have been?” I asked.
“From before she first appeared in Milan.”
“They say he was like a sculptor modelling the way she sang, the way she walked and talked.”
“He wass more Mephisto than Cellini. It wass Faust with a soprano singing the leading part.”
“It was all over by the time she came here, of course. One of the shortest marriages on record.”
“Marriage! He married Hermione Clery? When was that?”
“Seven years ago. And they are still legally man and wife. There are no divorces under the papist steeples of Italy.”
“So Mlle Clery is, or was, legally Signora Mario Cabezon? And you say he lives here in Edinburgh?”
“Cabezon was a Pygmalion jealous of every note his Galatea sang. After their separation, he followed her efferywhere: Rome, Paris, New York and finally here to Edinburgh at the beginning off the season. He had a box effery night she sang.”
“Was Cabezon here on the night she was murdered?”
“Odd the police neffer brought him into it. I wondered about that, I did.”
“What’s all this about, Artie?” said my friend, with a hand on my lapel. “Old Marwood’s coming to town on Thursday. He’s going to swing young Lambert on the new drop. Never been used before. Lambert will baptize it for all who’ll come after.”
“Marwood, the man from Horncastle,” said Hew, to no one in particular. “Time wass we had a proper Scots hangman. Didn’t need to share with the Sassenach. Now we can’t stretch a neck without a by-your-leave from Whitehall. But what do you expect? It’s just a mite of Scottish taxes that are spent in Scotland.” I did not try to stem this line of talk. I knew it had to play itself out.
In a moment one of the choristers, a dark-eyed beauty with her hair pinned up, a pinched waist, and wearing a pince-nez with the black ribbon pinned to her blouse, joined us. She had heard the talk about the execution, and wished to add her own bit of lore. “You ken what they say about a hanged man, don’t you, Jasper?” she said with a meaningful smile as she stood closer to the man than necessary.
“What is there to know about?” he asked. “He won’t be buying a round of drinks after Marwood does his job. Would you like to see it, Mrs Gibson?” I was formally introduced to the woman, Flora Gibson, chorister and understudy to the supporting lead soprano. She managed to look rather prim under her theatrical make-up and rather exciting at the same time.
“I don’t see why they hide it away from the public, Jasper. They could do anything to the poor man and we never the wiser. At least, he’ll have one last jolt of joy, just as the lights go out.”
“Are you daft, woman? What are you on about?”
“Oh, then I see that the great Mr Ballantyne has not completed his education. If you’re nice to me and buy me a sherry, just a little one, I might be persuaded to tell you.” The young woman looked at me as though she thought I might come between her and the glass of sherry she was soon holding. The talk spun away from me and I let it ramble without noticing more than the expression on the faces of those around me. When the conversation flagged a few minutes later, I remembered another of my questions.
“What do you know about Eward, apart from his pretty face and knowledge of music?” Hew considered this for a moment.
“Nothing at all. He wassn’t one of us, wass he? He kept accounts in the City Chambers. A copybook-blotter, that’s what he wass. Could add and subtract and efferything, I reckon. A harmless idiot, a bampot, that’s what he wass from what I hear.” Flora Gibson followed our talk with her eyes, as though it were a tennis match.
“And where was it you heard that?” I asked. Hew wiped foam from his mouth by applying his sleeve to the affected area and drawing it along until the buttons stung his lips. Mrs Gibson shot me a conspiratorial smile, but clung to Jasper. She tried to change the subject:
“I saw a couple topped together when I was a girl in Glasgow,” she said, returning to a more piquant line of conversation. She was leaning with her back against the rim of the bar so that the pattern of her camisole could be seen etched beneath the fabric of her blouse. “It didn’t frighten me a bit. The preacher had just married them as they stood together on the drop. Her name was Blackwood. I forget his name, but, then, she didn’t have it long, did she? She shouted ‘I will!’ and the hangman dropped her and her new husband through the floor!” Jasper and Hew stared at the woman, who was nearing the bottom of her ladylike glass of sherry. “He was dead in a few minutes, but it took her longer. Ever thought what it would be like, Hew?”
He returned Flora Gibson a wry smile, then looked at me. “You want to speak to John James M’Dougal in the Board of Works about Eward. He kens a thing or two, that one. Tell him I sent you.”
I made my departure at the next convenient moment and returned to the library after finding a shop in a close down a lane that would make me a sandwich. I was tempted to follow the lead Hew had given me, and wanted to inform Bell of the discovery of Sr Cabezon, but I found young Biggar waiting for me when I got back to my place.
“Himself has a message for you,” he said, looking put out and aggrieved, which I must say became Biggar.
“You mean Dr Bell?” I asked.
“Who else would be having me traipse all over town looking for you in all your secret holes? He said that it is extremely important and that you would know what it was about. He didn’t tell me.”
“Thank you, John. I know how Dr Bell relies on you and trusts you in these matters,” I said, trying unsuccessfully to mollify his jealousy. “What is the message?”
“You are to meet him at Waverley Station at 4:00 to catch the 4:15 train for York. Pack a bag and don’t be late.” I thanked Biggar and packed up my notes. I returned home and asked Bridget to put some clothes into a club bag for me. I was unsure whether this was to be a one-day excursion or one lasting two or more. Lambert’s appointment with the hangman made me certain that it was not for the rest of the week.
Given the lateness of the hour, I hailed a cab and told him to hurry to the station. The day had already lost its light and lamps were being lit in the shops along
the streets we drove through. The yellow reek of the town stood like a coloured gauze between me and the illuminated gas lamps, which looked out of focus and indistinct because of the mist. The fog gives us a new refraction, making seeing difficult, like trying to see through a snowstorm.
Bell was in the station with his housekeeper who was giving him instructions and impressing upon him, or trying to, the contents of his bag and the whereabouts of the tickets she placed in one of his inside pockets. He nodded and gesticulated and told her that he understood all of these things and would miss the train if she was determined to go over them again for the fourth time. “Ah, Doyle! I’m glad you got the message. I have the tickets. Don’t look so surprised. I will explain everything when we are aboard. Thank you, Mrs Murchie. You have been most kind!”
“I’ve put your pills in your bag and an extra pouch of tobacco under your pyjamas.”
“Mrs Murchie, really! I must protest. You are too kind.” Bell slipped me a wink and together we bade her goodbye and headed in the direction of the ticket controllers at the gate leading to the lines. Inside the station, the light was of the submarine sort that made one hurry to get through it. A large illuminated clock told the hour as men and women came along the platforms towards or from the coaches. Satanic engines spat out clouds of white vapour, as though trying to show the rest of the city the way proper fog ought to look. A little man walked along banging the wheels with a hammer, waiting for the dull sound of a cracked or broken one.
With Bell’s hand on my sleeve, we found the right track and a compartment in a coach of the right train. We were five minutes before the departure time, but by the time the train began to move, like a dead monster suddenly reanimated, we had placed our belongings on the racks above our heads, adjusted our bodies and settled into the mode most convenient for travel.
“Why, Dr Bell, are we hurtling out into the dark bound towards York this night?” I asked.
“A perfectly natural question. Also an obvious one. You’ll remember me speaking of the need to bring in a specialist at the time I wrote to my old student, Monty Corry? Well, Monty is the private secretary of the prime minister. The truth is, and I cannot say I am not excited by the prospect, that we are going to a rendezvous with the prime minister.”
“The prime minister? Do you mean we are meeting with Disraeli?”
“Lord Beaconsfield he is now. Much the same. Here, read over Monty’s telegram while I consult my Bradshaw’s in another matter.” Here he pulled the familiar yellow-wrapped volume from his bag and riffled through its pages, all the while continuing to address me: “Dizzy is the specialist I told you about. Do you remember?” I held the telegram in front of my eyes, but I could see no writing. The thought that I was on my way to see Benjamin Disraeli destroyed in me all thought, all desire. All I could do was babble and stare ahead.
TWENTY-TWO
As soon as the train came to a complete stop in York’s station, a conductor quickly showed us the way through gasps of steam from an engine to the stationmaster, who was watching for us as the train emptied about a third of its passengers and began to take on more than that many again for the rest of the journey south.
During the journey, I had had ample opportunity to describe in detail to my friend all that had passed since our last meeting. The revelations of The Wounded Stag were of particular interest and they opened up avenues of enquiry that we could follow as soon as the current adventure was concluded. Bell was amused by my description of Mrs Flora Gibson. “This must be regarded, Doyle, as a primitive mating ritual, or an approach to one. Your friend had better be on his guard. The woman seems dedicated to arousing his amorous propensities, as Dr Johnson once said about the same sort of theatrical persons. Helen Blackwood was executed twenty-six years ago. I doubt that Mrs Gibson was giving a very reliable account of the event, unless, of course, in your delightful description of the woman, you subtracted several years from her age.” I felt shamed and undone. I thought that I had hidden a momentary infatuation with the captivating singer with more skill.
The Stationmaster saluted Bell and asked us to follow him, which we did. He led us to the end of the platform on the extreme right end of the station, just under the high wall. The platform continued, uncovered a few hundred yards beyond this point and ended where a train of perhaps three or four cars was awaiting us. A bobby with a rosy face was already in place at the end of the last car. We were helped aboard by the stationmaster and a tall lean man of thirty-five or forty, who had appeared from the coach.
“Joe! Joe Bell! How are you, my dear chap, how are you?” The speaker’s smile disarmed me at once, as he enfolded his old friend in both arms. Joe introduced me to Montague Corry, who was a veritable warming-oven of goodwill as he brought us into the carriage, which was arranged as a drawing-room rather than the usual compartments.
He had the lineaments and bearing of an aristocrat, and having understood that, he made no further claim upon either his forebears or his high position. His greeting, in which I shared, couldn’t have been more friendly had we been long-lost cousins. Once the railway people had bowed out, he settled us into stuffed chairs and explained what was about to happen. In this there was nothing of the major-domo; one didn’t feel handled or processed. He told us, almost as though he were describing the rules of a new and wonderful game, that the prime minister was resting now, but that in about twenty minutes, perhaps less, he would awaken and take some light refreshment. At that time, he would take us to him.
My imagined pictures of the great involved endlessly receding corridors and liveried servants opening up one double door after another until the august presence is glimpsed enthroned at the far end of his sanctum sanctorum. Here in this simple railway car, the slightest suggestion of the pomp and circumstance of the Congress of Berlin or of the dignity of the office of prime minister was absent. Here all was business. I saw red despatch boxes and cartons of files labelled with the names of government departments. The difference between the imagined fiction and the flatfooted reality made my head spin.
Corry was already in conversation with Bell. From his questions I could see that he was as well versed in the affair as we were. He knew to the hour how much time remained to Alan Lambert. He explained the procedure by which the Home Office could be notified should we find the proofs necessary to grant a reprieve. He described the sort of evidence that would be required.
“It’s not enough, you see, to illuminate various facets of the case that didn’t come out at the trial. What you’ll need is hard, incontrovertible evidence that the court has rendered a wrong sentence. This must be based on new evidence, germane to the core of the enquiry. For instance, Dr Bell, it would not be enough to show that the culprit’s name was wrongly recorded or that he was incorrectly detained prior to having his charges read out to him.”
“Monty, when did you know me to be a fiddler with the edges of the picture. I am sure that we will be able to demonstrate that our man is innocent beyond a shadow of a doubt, just as he was found guilty in the face of a blizzard of doubt on almost every point raised in this prosecution.”
“The fact that there is no normal channel of appeal for Scottish cases is in your favour. But, when this step is taken, it is fair for me to tell you more convictions are upheld than are overturned. You are not out of danger, Joe. You are not acting without risk.”
“He is walking a tightrope without a net, my dear Corry. Good evening, gentlemen. Dr Bell, a real pleasure! Mr, soon-to-be Doctor Doyle. I have and value a portrait your uncle made of me; one of those foolish treasures that makes living worth all the dressing and undressing. No, don’t get up. I intend to join you at once. I try to be ever at my ease.” It was Disraeli, of course! So informal and yet at once so familiar. Here was the familiar face, with its darkish parchment skin and bright black eyes, the high forehead, the little curl in the middle, the stooped and studious posture. Disraeli, or as I should say, Lord Beaconsfield, for so he had been for the last three years,
looked like a caricature by Leach, Dicky Doyle, Vincent or Ape come to life from the pages of Punch or Spy. Dressed in solemn black, there was nothing solemn about his bearing or expression. He noted the way I was regarding him, probably noticing that my jaw had dropped from the intensity of the surprise. “Don’t believe it, sir,” he said. “You are seeing things: I am in fact the ghost of myself, an emanation. Or, if you prefer, you may set me down as the Canadian prime minister, whom I much resemble, if that would be easier on your spirits.” He smiled at Corry and at Bell, whom he leaned over to pat on the knee. “Monty came to me talking about you fifteen years ago and has continued this tattoo of unbridled praise without recess ever since. I call upon you to stem the flow of his adulation. You have done me a great service in coming here.” We all laughed at this, and it helped to expel the pressure in the carriage as air suddenly released from a caisson.
“Dr Bell, I don’t know whether you are aware of it, but the first detective in all the world, if you exclude the prophet Daniel, was a Scot like yourself: I am referring to Mr Lincoln’s indefatigable Mr Pinkerton. His youthful involvement with the Chartists was the cause of his leaving Glasgow for the New World.”
“I am not, sir, properly speaking, a detective. I have certain skills, a capacity to deduce the unknown from what is known. That is all.”
“Doctor, you will never pull down in ten minutes what Monty has been all these years building. Besides, there is no stigma attached to it. The detective is the modern knight errant. His quest, not a fair maiden in distress—not necessarily—but justice itself. I will happily drink a toast to the profession. Ah, and I see that now I can.”
A servant in a gold-and-black striped waistcoat appeared with a bottle of claret in a silver bucket, and reappeared in a moment with a tray of sandwiches.