The Deadly Fire

by Cora Harrison

  Alfie kept crouching down, but he knew that Jack had produced the block of clay, with its clear imprint of a boot.

  ‘Well, that might be useful.’ The constable didn’t sound too interested. ‘I’ll talk to the inspector in the morning before I go off duty.’

  Alfie breathed a silent prayer of thanks that Inspector Bagshott was not around. Perhaps Jack wouldn’t have to see him.

  ‘That’s not all, sir.’ Jack’s voice actually trembled now, but that did no harm.

  ‘Take your time, son, no need to worry.’ The constable’s voice was kind and soothing.

  ‘I was working at the demolition site opposite today. I was loading the old timbers and plaster into a cart and two men walked across the road and . . . and . . .’

  ‘Go on.’ The constable sounded interested now.

  ‘And, sir, the plaster dust was damp and this fellow that owns the property walked on it and . . . and . . .’ Jack’s words died away. Alfie even heard him gulp noisily before his voice returned to him, ‘and he left a print of his boot on the dust . . .’ Alfie could not see Jack’s face, but he had a horrible feeling that his cousin had forgotten his lines.

  ‘And what?’ The constable had a threatening note in his voice.

  ‘It’s Mr Lambert!’ blurted out Jack. ‘He’s the one that burned the teacher to death in the Ragged School. My cousin —’

  ‘Get out of here,’ shouted the constable. ‘Don’t you come in here making accusations against a respectable businessman! I’ll have you know that Mr Lambert is a personal friend of Inspector Bagshott. Get out immediately, before I change my mind and clap you into a cell.’

  Then there was noise of a door opening. Alfie could see Jack’s shadow on the pavement. He moved forward and then instantly turned to dart into the shelter of the doorway as another shadow followed.

  It was too late, though. He had been seen.

  ‘So that’s your cousin, that lying beggar brat, putting you up to tell more lies!’ roared the constable. He charged through the door and pounded up the street.

  Without Jack, Alfie could not have saved himself. In a moment his cousin was beside him and had gripped his arm, half dragging, half carrying him.

  ‘And you’re for the cells, too!’ The constable was getting dangerously near when there was a sound of a window being opened.

  ‘Shut your noise,’ screamed a voice from overhead. Alfie knew the old woman who lived there. Her temper was bad at the best of times, and now was obviously not the best of times.

  Looking over his shoulder, Alfie saw the contents of a chamber pot being emptied from the window. There was a string of curses from the constable and a spatter of something unmentionable on the pavement.

  Weak with laughter, Alfie thundered on the cellar door and Jack bolted it shut once Tom had opened it and they were both safely inside.

  ‘That was a lucky escape!’ Jack blew out a long breath of relief and then said shamefacedly, ‘Sorry, Alfie, I messed it up a bit.’

  ‘Not your fault,’ said Alfie. ‘Who would have guessed it?’ He turned to Sarah. ‘Mr Lambert is a great friend of Inspector Bagshott.’

  ‘We’ll have to leave it,’ said Jack. ‘No point in risking our skins again.’

  ‘What do you think, Alfie?’ asked Sarah, her eyes on him.

  ‘I’m not giving up,’ said Alfie stubbornly. He chewed his lip. If only he could get Inspector Denham out of bed and to the building site first thing in the morning, before anyone started work – but even Alfie realised that was impossible.

  It looked as though the man who set fire to the Ragged School was going to go scot free.

  CHAPTER 28

  THE INSPECTOR ARRIVES

  The next morning, Alfie and Jack reached the building site just as dawn was breaking. The fog still hung around and soft black smuts drifted through the air, landing in greasy smudges on their faces and hands. Alfie carried a sack slung over his shoulder holding the baked clay footprint. Once again Alfie compared the two footprints and showed them to Jack.

  ‘Ain’t no good me saying they are the same,’ said Jack in his practical way. ‘Who’s going to believe me, or you either, for that matter? Best forget it, Alfie. Hide that sack over there by the scaffolding. They’re coming. I can hear the noise of the horse’s hoofs.’

  ‘I’ll want you to drive the cart today, lad,’ said Mr Shawcross to Jack. ‘I’ve sacked the other fellow – no good with a horse, anyway.’

  As Alfie watched Jack leave with his first cartload, Mr Lambert, accompanied by Daniel Elmore, arrived in a smart chaise, closely followed by a hackney cab, filled with policemen. Immediately he crouched down beneath the scaffolding.

  Inspector Bagshott was first out and he strode up to the foreman.

  ‘Have you got a couple of boys working for you?’ he demanded.

  ‘That’s right,’ said Mr Shawcross. ‘One’s gone with the cart. The other was here just now. Where’s he gone? What’s the trouble, anyway?’

  ‘A pair of young criminals, apparently, according to the inspector here.’ Mr Lambert seemed quite his usual jolly self.

  ‘And I have a suspicion, from the inspector’s description, that one of them might be the boy who caused my poor father’s death by trying to rob him,’ added Daniel Elmore.

  ‘So we’d be obliged if you would get some of your men to help my constables find the young villains. They can’t have gone far if they were here a few minutes ago,’ said Inspector Bagshott.

  Both men, Daniel Elmore matching his pace to the slightly limping gait of Mr Lambert, walked towards a large pile of broken timber, followed by the inspector, while Mr Shawcross called a few men down from the scaffolding, telling them to help the constables.

  Alfie’s heart beat rapidly. Almost all of the men, glad of a rest from their hard work, had now joined the constables in the hunt. Sooner or later he would be discovered.

  And then there was a neigh and Jack drove the horse and the empty cart on to the building site.

  In a second, Alfie was out from under the scaffolding. Clutching the sack, he climbed on to the cart. ‘Quick, Jack!’ he hissed. ‘Get out of here, quick! Up that way!’

  ‘Go on, boy!’ shouted Jack.

  The lively horse responded instantly to the flick of the reins and the sound of Jack’s voice and began to trot. When the animal suddenly realised that, instead of a cartful of heavy timber and plaster, he now just had two skinny boys behind him, the trot lengthened into a gallop and he went thundering up the road.

  ‘Stop them! Stop, thief!’ went up the cry. Alfie looked over his shoulder and saw that Mr Lambert and Daniel Elmore had climbed into the chaise. Moments later, the whip descended on the horse’s back and the chaise leapt forward. Alfie looked ahead – the street was fairly empty and they were making good progress – and then he looked back again at the sound of more voices. The three policemen were shouting to a cabman. They were climbing in and the cab set off, rocking violently as it gathered speed.

  Streatham Street was full of the clatter of horse hoofs and the roaring of angry voices.

  The chase was on.

  CHAPTER 29

  THE CHASE

  The piebald horse seemed to know that this was a chase. He flew down the street, mane flying, ears back, long legs hardly touching the ground, the almost empty cart rattling behind him.

  ‘Into Broad Street, Jack!’ screamed Alfie. Suddenly he knew what he had to do.

  Not slacking speed for a moment, Jack swung the horse around into busy Broad Street. Carriages, cabs, road sweepers, dogs, people – all scattered before them. Alfie looked over his shoulder again. The two men, Mr Lambert and Daniel Elmore, seemed to be getting nearer to them, following closely in the traffic gap created by the piebald. The light chaise, drawn by a thoroughbred horse, was gaining on them rapidly. Alfie bit his lip but said nothing. Jack was doing his best. At least the policemen in their hackney cab were far behind them.

  ‘Where next?’ gasped Jack.

/>   ‘High Holborn,’ said Alfie. A large bread van, pulled by two horses, turned into Broad Street right in front of the cart. Jack swerved neatly and then pulled the horse to the right.

  For a minute, Alfie thought they might have escaped from the chaise, but a glance over his shoulder showed he was mistaken. Mr Lambert was on his feet now, urging his horse as if the streets were a race course.

  Suddenly, they slowed down. The traffic was just too dense for Jack to be able to find his way through it. The only consolation was that a heavy brewery cart was still between them and the chaise. Jack was leaning forward, straining his eyes for a gap in the traffic and the piebald, glad to be free of the dreary work of pulling a cartload of rubble, was still as fresh and lively as if it were the beginning of the morning.

  Then Alfie saw something that made his heart thud with terror. Mr Lambert had taken a coin from his pocket and was holding it up to the crowd on the pavement.

  ‘A golden guinea for the first man to stop those two boys!’ he yelled, pointing right at them.

  There was a cart piled high with sacks of coal drawn in close to the pavement.

  At Mr Lambert’s shout, the coalman immediately dumped the sack of coal and ran straight out into the roadway, his hand outstretched to catch the piebald’s bridle. There was no possibility of Jack swerving. He was hemmed in on all sides. The man’s hand shot out.

  But then the piebald reared up and his neigh rang out like a battle cry. The coalman backed away. The carriage ahead of Jack turned down an alleyway, the piebald bolted as though he saw a winning post ahead of them, and the cart went at a furious pace, hardly slackening for Holborn Hill.

  ‘Turn left, Jack, the next left, into Snow Hill.’

  Jack was laughing, but his eyes were locked on the road ahead and his body was tense. Alfie just concentrated. It was important now to make no mistakes, and finding your way in a speeding cart was a different matter to sauntering along the street, looking for road signs.

  The next left was Snow Hill, and Alfie sucked in a breath. Not too long now, he thought. The chaise was still on their tail, though, and now the hackney cab was just behind it. Inspector Bagshott was leaning out of the window and yelling, ‘Stop, thief!’

  There were crowds on both pavements, but no one responded to this cry. The piebald horse was a fearsome sight with froth dripping from his mouth, red nostrils straining, ears flat against his skull and those pounding hoofs striking sparks from the cobblestones.

  ‘Right, Jack, right!’ The turn into Cow Lane came almost immediately and Jack almost overshot it, but the piebald horse was game for everything.

  ‘Cross over Giltspur Street and under the arch-way!’ screamed Alfie. There was a shout from a man and a scream from a woman, but Jack was across Giltspur Street almost before the words had left Alfie’s mouth.

  The archway was built of brick, very tall and the piebald horse clattered under with a noise like thunder.

  Across the wide paved area they went until a large doorway was right in front of them.

  ‘Wait here, my man,’ said Alfie grandly as he struggled to get down without jarring his swollen leg too much. Over one shoulder was slung the sack with his precious evidence.

  ‘I’ll wait around the back so that you won’t be noticed,’ said Jack in his practical way.

  It was too late, though. As the cart moved away, Alfie heard a triumphant shout behind him. The chaise had just emerged from the archway and it was followed by the cab. And they had seen him! The cry of ‘Stop, thief!’ rose up again and several people stopped to stare.

  Alfie struggled up the stairs, knowing that his leg was slowing him up. There was no chance of escaping if he kept on going up in full view of his pursuers, so when he reached the first landing, he limped through the first doorway that he could find. He saw that he was in a large hall full of people, a few white-coated doctors walking quickly, some of the visitors looking at pictures on the wall, some of them standing in groups talking. Every head turned when the boy in ragged clothes came rushing in.

  And then every head swivelled again as the door burst open once more and in came three uniformed policemen, closely followed by two angry-faced men.

  CHAPTER 30

  STOP THAT BOY!

  There was no hope of escape. Politely, the crowd stood back, leaving an open pathway for the police to arrest the thief. Alfie looked around desperately. There were people everywhere, all clustering around him and blocking any possible escape. He could not even see a doorway.

  Putting his head down, he burst through a crowd of white-coated doctors just as the cry went up: ‘Stop that boy!’

  But now he was through the doctors and there was a door ahead of him. He was on its other side in a second and had slammed it behind him. There was a long narrow white-tiled corridor there and it was empty of people.

  A door on the far side opened and an empty wheeled-chair was thrust out, followed by a young doctor. It was the doctor who had dressed his leg, the doctor who had heard Sammy sing.

  Alfie darted across and flopped into the wheeled-chair, clutching the sack on his knee. ‘My leg is bad,’ he said urgently, just as the door from the big hall was pulled open. He gulped hard and then changed his mind and allowed a sob to break his voice. ‘I can’t run. Quick, take me to Inspector Denham, room 222! They’re trying to get me. Quick!’

  The young doctor asked no questions. He took hold of the back of the chair and began to run. Alfie looked back over his shoulder. They had left the crowd behind and reached the end of the corridor. The young doctor turned instantly to the right without slackening his speed.

  ‘Lucky for you that I played ball for Rugby School,’ he said as he sprinted to the top of this new corridor and then wheeled sharply to the left. Alfie just had sight of the number 222 before the young doctor had opened the door with one hand and pushed him inside with the other.

  ‘A visitor for you, Inspector Denham,’ he said as he closed the door behind them.

  Inspector Denham, Alfie saw to his dismay, was not alone. A tall, thin middle-aged woman, dressed in a luxurious velvet coat, was sitting beside his bed.

  ‘ . . . this terrible poverty at St Giles —’ she was saying as the door was thrown open.

  ‘Alfie!’ cried the inspector.

  ‘Sorry to interrupt,’ said Alfie feebly. He wondered how long he would have to explain, but he didn’t wonder for long.

  The door was flung open again and the three policemen crowded into the room, followed by Mr Lambert and Mr Elmore.

  Inspector Bagshott immediately grasped Alfie by the arm. ‘You young villain,’ he said harshly. ‘I’ll make sure that you get a good long sentence in jail after all of this.’ Then he looked at the figure lying on the bed, no longer dressed in gown and nightcap, but wearing a respectable suit, and he gasped.

  ‘What are you doing here, sergeant?’ asked Inspector Denham grimly.

  ‘Inspector, sir. Been promoted in your unavoidable absence,’ gasped Inspector Bagshott.

  Alfie looked from one inspector to the other and his spirits began to rise. Bullying Bagshott had softened his tone of voice considerably. Alfie decided that the time had come for him to take charge.

  ‘Brought you the bootprint from the Ragged School fire, Inspector Denham,’ he said, getting out of the wheeled-chair and advancing towards the bed, holding out the piece of baked clay. The lady sitting beside the bed took it from him firmly, looked at it with curiosity and then passed it over to Inspector Denham. Alfie saw a look of fury on Mr Lambert’s face and Inspector Bagshott’s cheeks flushed an unpleasant mixture of red and purple.

  ‘This is the boy I was telling you about, from the St Giles area, Miss Burdett-Coutts,’ said Inspector Denham and she nodded and turned to Alfie.

  ‘And here,’ said Alfie emphatically, ‘is the man who made that print.’ He pointed dramatically at Mr Lambert. ‘His name is Lambert. He made the print on the clay in the cupboard by the door of the Ragged School when he poured
the oil all over the paper in the cupboard and set fire to the school. He wanted to get rid of the school so that he could knock down the old houses in the whole street and build some posh new ones.’

  ‘Rubbish,’ said Mr Lambert with a scornful laugh. ‘This boy is a thief and he caused the death of the father of my friend here.’

  ‘That’s true, inspector,’ said Daniel Elmore. ‘My friend and I have come along with your men to make sure that this boy is taken to court and accused of robbery with violence.’

  Inspector Denham weighed the clay in his hands, his keen eyes under the bushy eyebrows studying the clay imprint, then he looked at Mr Lambert.

  ‘Perhaps you would be good enough to take off your right boot, Mr Lambert,’ he said softly. ‘Hand it to Sergeant Bagshott.’

  There was a dead silence in the room. Lambert had been looking at the unwieldy piece of clay on its board with bewilderment, but now Alfie saw his face change. Finally, Lambert had realised the significance of the print.

  ‘I certainly will not take off my boot,’ he blustered. ‘Why are you listening to a beggar brat who is a liar, a thief and probably a murderer? I’ll have you know, inspector, that I have friends in high places and that I will speak to them about you if there is any more of this nonsense.’

  ‘Take off your boot, sir,’ repeated Inspector Denham, and he still spoke in that soft voice. ‘Constable . . .’

  He looked towards the two policemen and, in that instant, Mr Lambert turned and shot through the door, slamming it behind him.

  ‘After him,’ roared Inspector Denham. ‘Catch him!’

  The two constables clutched their hats and started to blow their whistles, but the young doctor was ahead of them. Alfie limped to the door to watch. Inspector Denham got off the bed and stood beside him, and Miss Burdett-Coutts joined them.

  Mr Lambert was not a good runner. He could not have outdistanced the constables for long, but the young doctor made sure of the matter by a flying tackle which brought the property developer to the ground. And then he sat on him!