Murder at the British Museum

by Jim Eldridge

  ‘I suppose you’ve had to visit it often during your career.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Daniel. ‘Sometimes for information when a prisoner has something to trade for a reduced sentence. Sometimes just to confront someone you’ve been chasing for a long while.’ He headed towards a waiting omnibus. ‘Well, with Algernon Pope accounted for,’ said Daniel, ‘our next stop will be Horace Bell. And I must warn you, this may not be pleasant. People who are sacked for drunkenness are invariably foul-mouthed, filthy and liable to be violent when challenged. Are you sure you want to seek him out?’

  ‘You’ll be with me,’ said Abigail. ‘And I can take care of myself.’

  John Feather sat in Grafton’s office and waited. He could tell that Grafton was deliberating just how much to tell him. Yes, his old friend had definitely taken on the persona of Special Branch.

  ‘I’ve had a word,’ said Grafton. ‘It might be useful, this manhunt for Kelly. There’s a possibility he’s fled over the water, back to Ireland. But he might still be here. And if he is and we can lay our hands on him, that would be good.’

  ‘So, was Pickering the target for the killing, Walter, or was it someone else?’ asked Feather.

  Grafton shook his head. ‘I’m not at liberty to say,’ he said. ‘But if your boys bring him in, it will be appreciated.’

  Instead of the shuffling, dribbling, filthy drunken wreck Daniel had anticipated, Horace Bell was a man who positively glowed with good spirits of the spiritual rather than the alcoholic kind. And his small house, rather than being a hovel filled with empty bottles and reeking of cheap gin, was clean and neatly cared for.

  ‘We’re sorry to trouble you, Mr Bell, but we’ve been asked by the British Museum to investigate the recent difficult events there.’

  ‘The murder,’ said Bell. ‘I saw it in the paper.’

  ‘And other incidents,’ said Daniel. ‘Some vandalism.’

  Bell smiled. ‘And I’m guessing you’ve come to ask me whether the vandalism might have been me because of them sacking me.’

  Daniel and Abigail exchanged surprised looks.

  ‘Well …’ began Daniel.

  ‘Nothing could be further from the truth!’ said Bell cheerily. ‘Getting the boot from the museum was the best thing that ever happened to me. It brought me to my senses! You see, the museum had always been good to me, Mr Ashford in particular. But how did I repay his kindness and concern? By getting blind drunk, time and time again! I was a mess, sir and madam! Truth to tell, I took the museum for granted because they were so caring. What I needed, sir and madam, was not worried looks and concern, I needed the iron rod to bring me to the right path! Yes, sir and madam, being told I was dismissed, and seeing the hurt look on Mr Ashford’s face and realising the pain I’d brought on that good man, I couldn’t live with myself. Not the way I was. So, I stopped drinking, sir and madam. Not even a small beer passes my lips these days. I have done with it! The demon drink is my downfall no longer!

  ‘I now have regular employment at a greengrocer’s. Not as nice as when I was at the museum, a lot of it is outdoors, unloading crates of vegetables from the wagons when they deliver. But it is honest work! And it keeps me healthy and away from taverns. Yes, sir, getting the sack saved my life. And, if you see Mr Ashford, I’d be appreciative if you’d tell him so. That what he was forced to do – by my selfish and unsocial behaviour – saved my life.’

  ‘Well, I think we can also cross Horace Bell off our list of possible suspects,’ said Daniel, as they headed home.

  ‘A veritable conversion,’ said Abigail. ‘And Algernon Pope also out, that means we are left with Mr Ashford …’

  ‘Very unlikely, in my opinion,’ said Daniel doubtfully.

  ‘I agree,’ said Abigail. ‘From the way that Bell spoke of him, and our own experiences with the man, I would hate it if he turned out to be the murderer.’

  ‘Then there are Tudder and Mrs Pickering working together with an unknown assassin,’ continued Daniel. ‘But, again, very doubtful, especially now we know about Elsie Bowler.’

  ‘Elsie Bowler is a possibility,’ said Abigail.

  ‘Indeed, if we can find her. As is John Kelly Junior.’ He frowned thoughtfully. ‘I’m not sure of our next move.’

  ‘I am,’ said Abigail. ‘You need to read Professor Pickering’s book.’

  ‘Why?’ asked Daniel.

  ‘Because you promised you would.’

  ‘But you’ve already told me everything I need to know about Ambrosius,’ protested Daniel.

  ‘Second-hand information,’ countered Abigail. ‘You’re always saying how important it is to go back to the source. Well, I suggest you start the book this evening, and then continue reading it when we get to the museum tomorrow morning while we’re waiting for Mr Whetstone to arrive.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Abigail stood at the kitchen range, poking the potatoes bubbling away in the saucepan on the hob with a thin knife.

  ‘How are you getting on?’ she asked Daniel, who sat in his armchair turning over the pages of Professor Pickering’s book with a perplexed expression on his face.

  He gave a sigh. ‘I cannot see anything in here that would a reason for murder,’ he said. ‘It’s interesting, linking this Ambrosius with King Arthur, but so what?’

  ‘The Children of Avalon were upset by it,’ pointed out Abigail.

  ‘Yes, but enough for a couple of idiots to smash a glass case. That’s a far cry from killing someone.’ He shook his head. ‘There’s nothing here.’

  ‘You’ve only read about a quarter of the book.’

  ‘And it feels like a lifetime.’ He looked at the clock. ‘Those are two lost hours I’ll never get back.’ He shut the book and put it aside. ‘Frankly, from what I’ve read and everything we’ve learnt so far, I’m of the opinion that John Kelly Junior and the Irish Republican Brotherhood are starting to look the most likely.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I’m coming back to what you, Joe Dalton and John Feather have already suggested: maybe it’s the institution itself that’s being attacked. The British Museum is seen as one of the bastions of the Empire. And the Irish Republican Brotherhood hate the British Empire.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Haven’t you been following the arguments for and against home rule in the newspapers?’ asked Daniel. ‘It’s been going on for long enough.’

  ‘To be honest, although I was aware of the campaign, other things were my priority.’

  ‘Digging in Egypt.’

  ‘Not just Egypt. Palestine. Rome. Greece.’

  ‘It’s often struck me that, after those places, being in England must seem very boring.’

  ‘How can you say that?’ demanded Abigail. ‘I’d hardly describe being part of a team investigating violent murders as boring!’

  ‘Yes, but it’s not very exotic, is it. Not after the Middle East and places like that.’

  ‘You were going to tell me about this home rule issue,’ she said firmly, turning her attention back to the potatoes.

  ‘What do you know about it already?’ asked Daniel.

  ‘What everyone else does. That Ireland wants independence from Britain. The thing is, the level of violence that seems to be happening in the name of this independence seems to indicate something much stronger. Angrier.’

  ‘Indeed,’ said Daniel. ‘The Act of Union which made Ireland part of Britain only came into effect at the start of the century, in 1801. But British occupation of Ireland has caused anger in Ireland for hundreds of years. You could trace it back to Henry VIII and the break from the Catholic church.’

  ‘Religion again!’ Abigail sighed.

  ‘I’m afraid so. The population of Ireland remained mainly Catholic after Henry’s break with Rome, with no sign of changing to the new Protestant faith. So, after Henry’s death, his daughter Elizabeth and then King James I took large areas of Ireland away from the Irish and gave it to English Protestant gentry to rule over the Catholics.�
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  ‘Surely there must have been uprisings against them?’

  ‘There were, but they were suppressed by the army. And then even more so under Oliver Cromwell, who was fiercely anti-Catholic. It was calculated that at the siege of Drogheda, Cromwell’s forces massacred about 4,000 people. Not all soldiers.’

  Abigail smiled. ‘I thought I was supposed to be the one with a history degree, but here I am being given a course in Irish and British history. How do you know so much about it? Surely not from just being a detective at Scotland Yard.’

  ‘No, from spending much of my life here in Camden Town,’ said Daniel. ‘When you’ve been here a bit longer you’ll realise that it has one of the largest populations of Irish immigrants in London.’

  ‘Why’s that?’

  ‘Because of Euston Station. Which connects with the boat train from Liverpool. During the Famine, thousands of Irish left Ireland to come to England. Most caught the boat from Dublin to Liverpool, and those who didn’t want to stay in Liverpool came to London, where it was said the streets were paved with gold. They didn’t find gold, but they found other Irish who’d emigrated earlier, so they moved in. The result was it was impossible to live in this area without hearing stories of the troubles the Irish had suffered at the hands of the British, especially under Oliver Cromwell, and then the Famine.’

  ‘The Famine was before my time, and we really didn’t hear much about it in Cambridge.’

  ‘You would have if Cambridge had been home to thousands of immigrant Irish,’ said Daniel. ‘The 1840s.’

  ‘As I said, before I was born,’ said Abigail.

  ‘The potato crop failed,’ said Daniel. ‘Blight. There was no food. A million died in Ireland, and another million fled the country, some coming to England, thousands of others to America. The Irish blamed the absentee English landlords.’

  ‘Surely they must have seen that they weren’t responsible for the crops getting blight.’

  ‘Yes, but the landlords were responsible for the fact that most of the cattle that grazed their Irish lands were sent to England as beef, while the Irish starved. The Irish view was that if they’d been allowed to own their own lands they could have decided what the land could be used for, crops, beef, whatever. The fact was that by the start of the century, the Irish only owned five per cent of the land, while absentee English landlords and the Crown owned the rest of it.’

  ‘Hence the demand for home rule.’ Abigail sighed. ‘Own your own land and decide what you do with it.’

  ‘Exactly,’ said Daniel. ‘You can see where the anger comes from that drives the Republic Brotherhood and the like. People think it’s just about politics, who’s in charge. But really it’s about the fact that a million died and another million were forced to leave their home country for ever.’

  ‘You sound like you’re sympathetic to this Brotherhood?’

  Daniel shook his head. ‘I’m sympathetic to what the Irish suffered, but I could never condone violence and murder. If it turns out that the Irish Republican Brotherhood was behind the murder of Professor Pickering, I’ll track them down and bring them to justice.’

  ‘Well while you’re considering that, you can go and wash your hands,’ said Abigail. ‘The potatoes are ready. I’ll mash them and get the sausages out of the oven and serve.’

  ‘The sausages are cooked?’ queried Daniel.

  ‘To perfection.’ Abigail smiled happily.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  As Daniel and Abigail walked into the museum the next morning, they were immediately accosted by the attendant on duty at the front entrance.

  ‘Mr Wilson, Miss Fenton, Sir Jasper said for you to go up and see him as soon as you arrived.’

  Daniel frowned. ‘Sir Jasper’s in early,’ he commented.

  ‘Indeed, sir. And, may I say, he looked quite worried.’

  ‘Trouble,’ muttered Daniel to Abigail.

  They hurried up the stairs to Sir Jasper’s office and found him in his office staring worriedly at a sheet of paper.

  ‘It’s another letter,’ he said.

  As before, it contained just a few handwritten lines, and was brief and to the point:

  We are not fools. Your trap was obvious. We warned you not to tell the police. You will pay for that. The price is now £2,000. You will leave the parcel of money as before, beneath the same bench at Clarence Gate. A further letter will tell you when.

  ‘Can I see the previous letter?’ asked Abigail.

  Sir Jasper opened a drawer in his desk, took it out and gave it to her.

  ‘It’s written by a different person,’ she said, showing them the differences in the handwriting. ‘I’d also say that this latest letter was written by a girl. It’s in a more feminine hand, but not yet fully confident. I would suggest a girl in her middle teens.’

  ‘So, this is definitely a conspiracy, but one involving children,’ mused Daniel. ‘That suggests a hoax, if children are involved.’

  ‘Not all children are innocents,’ said Abigail. ‘This could have been written at the direction of someone else, an adult, to disguise their handwriting. Or to make it look like a conspiracy of more than one person.’

  ‘What shall we do?’ asked Sir Jasper.

  ‘Again, my advice, Sir Jasper, is to inform the police.’

  ‘It didn’t work last time,’ said Sir Jasper sadly.

  ‘No, and if it turns out they were watching, it will be even harder to mount a proper watch on the bench.’

  ‘I wonder why they say they will send details of when the transaction is to take place later, rather than give the time and say now, as they did before?’ mused Abigail.

  ‘To prolong the agony,’ said Daniel. ‘They’re playing with us.’ He tapped the letter and asked, ‘May I hang on to this for the moment, Sir Jasper? We’re due to meet with Inspector Feather this morning. He’s coming here to talk with us to Mr Whetstone about Professor Pickering. We’ll show this to the inspector and let him pass the information on to Superintendent Armstrong.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Sir Jasper, then groaned. ‘This whole business is turning into a nightmare. I can’t sleep at night for wondering what dreadful thing might happen next.’

  Daniel picked up the letter and put it in his pocket, then he and Abigail left Sir Jasper to his gloomy thoughts and headed back down to the main reception area.

  ‘I suppose we just wait here for John Feather and this Mansfield Whetstone to arrive,’ said Daniel.

  ‘No,’ said Abigail firmly. ‘What you have to do is take this opportunity to dig further into the book.’

  ‘Why?’ demanded Daniel.

  ‘I told you, for clues,’ said Abigail.

  ‘There aren’t any!’ insisted Daniel.

  ‘You can’t say that until you’ve read it.’

  ‘I’ve read most of it,’ said Daniel.

  ‘I’ll wait down here to look out for Inspector Feather while you retreat upstairs to our office to look at the book in peace.’

  ‘Slave-driver,’ grumbled Daniel. ‘You’re worse than Abberline ever was.’

  Nevertheless, he headed upstairs to their office, while Abigail returned to looking at the exhibition again, in the hope of some kind of enlightenment. After half an hour of intensive examination, none was forthcoming, and she was relieved to see the arrival of John Feather.

  ‘Morning, Miss Fenton.’

  ‘Abigail, please.’

  ‘Yes, sorry, force of habit.’ Feather smiled. ‘Where’s Daniel?’

  ‘He’s upstairs in our office, reading the professor’s book while we wait for Mr Whetstone to arrive,’ said Abigail. ‘He’s hoping to find some clues in it. And there’s been another letter demanding money.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Daniel’s got it. He’s waiting to show it to you.’

  ‘Well, I’ve also got something to report. My contact inside Special Branch says he’s happy for us to set up a manhunt for young John Kelly. But he’s not saying whether
Pickering was the target, or not.’

  ‘Hopefully, things will be moving forward,’ she said. She led the way towards the winding staircase to their small office ‘Let’s go and update Daniel. I gather you’ve known him for a long time.’

  ‘Years,’ said Feather. ‘I was a young copper just promoted from uniform when I joined Abberline’s team at Scotland Yard. Daniel was Abberline’s sergeant. I learnt everything I know about being a detective from watching the pair of them. Fred Abberline was the tops, but Daniel ran him a very close second. He had a copper’s nose. Still has. He’s got this sixth sense of being able to sniff out guilt. That’s one of the reasons the superintendent can’t stand him.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because Armstrong doesn’t have it, and never will. He doesn’t understand how Daniel does what he does, all he knows is that Daniel succeeds where he fails, and that riles him.’

  ‘You said “one of the reasons”.’

  Feather smiled. ‘Years ago when Armstrong and Daniel were both detective sergeants, Daniel found Armstrong trying to beat a confession out of a man.’

  ‘What?!’

  ‘Daniel dragged Armstrong away and hit him. Almost laid him out.’

  ‘Was the man guilty?’

  ‘No, he turned out to be quite innocent. But Daniel said that was irrelevant. We were the protectors of the law, not abusers of it. Armstrong’s never forgiven him.’

  Abigail pushed open the door of their office and Daniel looked up at them from the book.

  ‘Morning, Daniel,’ said Feather.

  ‘Good morning, John,’ Daniel greeted him.

  ‘How are you getting on with the book?’ asked Feather.

  Daniel gave an unhappy scowl. ‘Give me Charles Dickens any time,’ he said.

  ‘I’ve told him about the latest letter,’ said Abigail, ‘and John’s got news of his own.’