Jack, Knave and Fool

by Alexander, Bruce

  “And when did the ostler say the mare had been bought —a week ago?”

  “No, sir,” said I, “he said a week ago or more. I would wager it was something like two weeks past.”

  “The owner of the stable would know, of course. He would keep a record of the transaction.”

  “And who knows, Mrs. Bradbury could’ve kept the animal a day or two, wondering what to do with it.”

  “This stable—you say it’s very near the pawnshop on Bedford?”

  “Oh, very near, sir. It’s on Half-Moon just before it narrows into the passage to the Strand.”

  “Of course, I know the place. I’ve smelled it a score of times as I passed by.” He said nothing for a moment, then, with pursed lips, gave a wise nod. “It could be the very horse George Bradbury rode from Warwick. If we can prove that it was sold to the stablemaster by one of our three conspirators, then we know that he arrived safe in London.”

  “And was murdered here,” I offered.

  “That is a bit of a leap, yet one we might take. We shall see.”

  “Jeremy!” Annie called crossly. “It’s not every day you get eggs for breakfast. Don’t let them get cold.”

  I looked down and found a plate of eggs and rashers before me. How or when it had appeared there I had no idea, so taken was I in communicating my information to Sir John. I nodded to her and fell to the feast.

  “When you have finished eating, Jeremy, I should like you to return to that stable on Half-Moon, find the owner, and get from him all the particulars you can. If his description of the seller of the white horse should match one of the two we have in custody, then bring him along to Bow Street —tell him I insist that he come —and we shall have him identify him or her face-to-face.

  “It will be done, sir, just as you say.”

  Then did I hear a clopping on the stairs which I knew well from yesterday. It was Miss Pooh, descending to breakfast in my old shoes.

  “But damn,” said Sir John, “I fear I must detain you further, lad. I must be shaved again this morning for that Laningham dinner we attend tonight. But then again, it was just yesterday you shaved me, was it not?”

  “No sir, the day before that.”

  He rubbed his jowls critically. “Ah well,” said he, “I suppose I’m due.”

  My return visit to the stable proved only partly successful. When I first looked in at the location, one of the two ostlers present (the night man, who had of course by then gone home, was not one of them) advised me that the owner of the stable was not expected in for an hour or more. I told him that I had come at the behest of Sir John Fielding of the Bow Street Court, and that I would return in an hour to speak with his master then.

  I had another matter to attend to. Sir John had also asked me to look in at the pawnshop and give the place a cursory examination — to pay particular attention to the upstairs rooms and look for traces of blood about.

  “They could not have separated head from body without spilling blood,” he had said to me. “Yet keep your eye open for anything you believe might be of interest. And oh yes, one thing specifically I should like you to bring back to us, should you find it. Our man Roundtree is a carpenter, is he not? If you run across his box of tools, that would be something I should like to have.”

  And so, as I walked from the stable to the pawnshop, I reflected upon Sir John’s instructions, realizing full well the significance of his request for Roundtree’s toolbox.

  Bedford Street, at that hour of a cold January morning, was quite a dismal sight. Though the taverns and grogshops never closed, or so it seemed, they were probably near empty. One or two of them were being cleaned, after a fashion; I saw a door open and a man in the shadows sweeping the filth of the night out onto the walkway. I heard water splashed in another, followed by the rhythmic swishing of a mop passing over the boards of the floor. Far down the street, beyond Henrietta, I caught sight of a single figure, a woman, staggering insensibly on her way to whatever bed or pallet she might claim as her own.

  Then to the pawnshop. I took from my pocket the key to the place, given by Mr. Bailey to Mr. Baker and by Mr. Fuller to me. Pleased at how easily it turned in the lock, I stepped inside and locked it again. I found a candle on the counter and lit it, for though it was morning without, it was dusk within. Then did I begin my inspection of the premises. There was far more to the ground floor than I had supposed. Two rooms were filled with oddments of every sort — clothes, musical instruments of every sort and sound, clocks, paintings, even a piece of statuary set in one corner —all of this in no apparent order, simply hung, stacked, and leaned all higgledy-piggledy about, filling the space completely. Looking hopelessly from one room to the next, I realized that I could spend days going through each, and so, for the time being at least, I decided to leave them unexamined, and searched for the stairs to the upper floor.

  I found them at the very rear of the edifice and ascended. There were but three rooms above. There was something tight, cramped, and mean about them. They were kept neat enough, which surprised me somewhat considering the disorder below; nevertheless the walls were bare of pictures of any sort (with so many below!), and the furniture, though large and cumbersome, was rather sparse.

  Going to the bedroom, I gave considerable attention to the mattress. Sir John seemed to have reasoned that George Bradbury had been murdered in his bed; whether he had been decapitated there was another matter entirely. In any case, when I stripped down the sheet and comforter from it, I gave the mattress a thorough going-over. It was feather-filled and dusty; look as I might, I found no trace of blood on it. Yet I did make an interesting discovery when I took the trouble to search through a high chest of many drawers and the wardrobe beside it — or rather, it was a matter of what I failed to discover. The drawers were filled with shifts, lace undergarments, and nightdresses of the sort worn by ladies of quality, and stockings and garters. The wardrobe was crammed to bursting with frocks and gowns of every sort, color, and weight. There was not a single piece of male attire to be found in the bedroom.

  The kitchen was quite ordinary. The only thing worthy of note was that it did not look to me as if it had been used much of late. There was little food in it —a jar of flour and another of sugar, both near full, but no barrel of potatoes, no carrots or turnips, and certainly no meat about. There was a good-sized teapot upon the table; I looked inside it and found it half full of black tea. On a shelf next the unused fireplace, I found a half loaf of bread and a bit of cake covered over with a cloth, still fairly fresh. It seemed that Mrs. Bradbury had done most of her dining in eating places about the town. Perhaps she always had.

  As for the parlor, which looked out over the street, it also served as a dining room and had in it a table much too large for such a limited space, and eight chairs. There was a couch, also a bit too large, and two conversation chairs. All together, it made for a rather crowded room. I was about to leave it, when something caught my eye. I turned back to look at the table and saw that it had upon it the only piece of decoration to be seen in any of the three rooms —a small vase, blue and white. I reached over, picked it up, and examined it. It was delicate and thin-walled, of porcelain. I noted the dragon design upon it and determined that it could only be of Chinese origin. Here, though I took no joy in my discovery, was one mystery solved.

  I had seen nothing of Roundtree’s tools. Perhaps they were not here at Bradbury’s. He could as easily have returned them to his room in Half-Moon Passage. Yet I had to look. I descended the stairs to make my search. In that second room of storage, the one farthest to the rear of the house, I found an area hollowed out of the clutter before a fireplace, which must have been located directly below that in the kitchen. Before it was a pallet bed with a wad of clothes at one end which had served as a pillow. This, I felt certain, was where Roundtree had hidden himself from us, close enough to make visits to Clarissa and watch over her after his fashion. This fireplace had had heavy use. There was some evidence he had cooked
here, too, though it had no proper accommodation for cooking. Here was a dirty plate, a fork, a spoon. I could picture that poor scarecrow of a man huddling before his blaze, eating what little his protectors (or perhaps, in a sense, his captors) had allowed him to have. This was what it meant to be a fugitive. This was what it meant to mix in murder.

  I looked around and located his toolbox with no difficulty. It was tucked in at one side of the fireplace, half hidden from sight —but only half. It was near full, yet there was just room in it, I thought, for the purpose I had in mind.

  Looking about, I found copies of the Public Advertiser which he may have used to start his fire, and tearing up the paper, I wrapped the Chinese vase as carefully as I could. I placed it in an empty spot between the hammer and the saw.

  Then was I ready at last to return to the stable.

  At my second visit, the owner of the place was indeed present, a man of advanced years but still sturdy and able. He was brought to me by the ostler to whom I had inquired earlier.

  “So you’re the lad sent over by the magistrate. What is it he wants of me?”

  I caught him glancing curiously at the carpenter’s box in my hand, though he said nothing about it. Taking that opportunity, I laid it down upon the floor.

  “Your name, first of all, sir.”

  He seemed to think that rather rude and blunt from one of my years. Still, he answered: “Matthew Gurney.” Then, with a frown: “Was it that team you hired last night? Maybe they wasn’t the best. I’ll refund the cost if that’ll make it right. I wish to stay on good terms with the law.”

  “No, it’s nothing to do with that,” said I. “but your’re right—the horses were not the best. No, I was sent to inquire about the white horse, the mare in the third stall there.”

  Mr. Gurney gave a little chuckle at that. “Now you are talking about the best. Yes indeed, she’s the best animal in my stable.” A dreadful thought did at that moment assail him: “She wasn’t stole, was she? I’d hate to lose her and the sum I paid.”

  “Nooo, not exactly, but the horse plays a part in a matter that Sir John Fielding now has before him.”

  “And what matter is that?”

  “I’m not now permitted to say.”

  “Well … what do you wish to know?”

  “Two things, fundamentally, though I should be happy to hear whatever you may have to add. First, who sold it to you? A man, or perhaps a woman?”

  “I’ve his name on the bill of purchase I made out at the time. It’s in my desk in back.” He stirred in that direction. “I could fetch it for you.”

  “Yes, I should like to see it,” said I, “but the name he used may well have been a false one. What did he look like?”

  “Oh, yes, well, he was a young fellow — not as young as you, I’d say, but young enough.”

  “Not a tall man of over thirty years?”

  “Oh no, not near that age. About ten years shy of it, I’d say. He was about your height but not so broad across the chest, nor stout in the legs as you are.”

  Jackie Carver, of course. In a sense I was relieved that it was not Roundtree, yet it eliminated the possibility of certain identification of the seller.

  With no prodding from me, Mr. Gurney began to expand a bit on the matter of the sale: “As I remembers it, this young fella said he was acting as factor for a third party, a widow out beyond Clerkenwell. Her husband had lately died and left her the farm. She would rent the fields and tend the usual farm animals, but she had no use for the horse, which was her late husband’s pride and joy. She had asked this young fellow to sell it for her and had made out a paper giving him permission to act in her behalf—all that legal language. Only thing made me doubt was that if she knew little of horses — as he said —then he knew less.”

  “Oh? How could you tell?”

  “Well, for one thing he didn’t ride her in, and anyone knew horses would have counted it a treat to ride so fine a mount. And mind you, he didn’t lead her in by her bridle but by a rope tied round her neck.”

  “He led her all the way from beyond Clerkenwell? Did he say why he had not tried to sell the animal to some stable nearer the farm?”

  “No, he did not, and that made me wonder, too. But in all truth, I was so eager to have her — and at such a price! —that I chose to ignore such details. Y’see, that was something else told me he knew nothing of horses. The price he asked for her was not even half her worth. Ah, but I kept my wits about me and haggled him down still further—just so he wouldn’t know he was asking too little, of course.”

  “Of course,” said I. He seemed to have told his tale entire. I gave him a moment, but when he added nothing more, I suggested he might now go and fetch his bill of purchase. “That would carry the date of the transaction, would it not? That is the other bit of information I would have from you.”

  “Oh, that was not so long ago —ten days past or a few more.”

  “Sir John wants the date exact.”

  “And you shall have it.” Off he went, moving as swift as his old legs would carry him. Though he knew naught of this matter and the implications of the information he had given, he had become eager to cooperate.

  I wandered over for another look at the white mare. Awake, she was even more impressive than before. There was keen intelligence in her eyes. She seemed somewhat distrustful, perhaps for good reason. When I extended my hand to touch her long nose, she backed up sharply out of my reach. Perhaps someday I would learn to ride, I thought, and when I did, I would come and ride this very horse. (Alas, reader, neither ambition have I realized.) Returning to my post beside Roundtree’s box of tools, I waited, and it was not long before Mr. Gurney made his appearance. He returned waving two pieces of paper quite proudly.

  “How times does fly,” said he. “I have it on the bill of purchase that it was exactly two weeks ago today that I bought the horse. I had not thought it quite so long ago. But here it is, you see.”

  He handed it over, and I examined the document with some care. Fourteen days past: on that Sunday, Thomas Roundtree had sat in the strong room there at Number 4 Bow Street, and that evening we had gone off to the Crown and Anchor and watched the late Lord Laningham die a miserable death on the stage before us. Reading on, I saw that Mr. Gurney had acquired the mare, “dubbed Princess,” for ten guineas; she had to have been worth much more indeed. At the bottom of the short paragraph which set forth the sale, on the line following “Seller” was a large “X” and the words, “John Cutter, his mark.” That would translate easily to Jackie Carver, would it not?

  “And this paper here,” said Mr. Gurney, “this is the one that made it legal for him to act for her in the sale of the mare. He left it with me, which was the right thing to do, I suppose.”

  Taking it from him, I merely glanced over it. The document was as he had described it and was written out in a proper “feminine” hand —cursive and flowing, as Lady Fielding had set the distinction. What caught my eye, however, was the name that Mrs. Bradbury had chosen for herself: “Grace Hope.” To what would that translate? What else but to one who stands in hope of God’s grace. She had then—perhaps the morning after the murder of her husband—some sense of having committed a great sin. I resolved to tell Sir John of this, that he might make the most of it.

  “Now, Mr. Gurney,” said I, returning the two documents to him, “I return these to you in the expectation that you will keep them safe. They may later be needed as evidence in a trial of law.”

  “Is that so?” He looked at me most soberly. “But it’s got nothing to do with whether the horse was stole?”

  “No sir,” said I. “That would be the least of it.”

  “Oh,” said he, as he considered what might be the most of it. “I’ll put them in my strongbox.”

  “Do that,” said I, “but let me pass on to Sir John that you will say nothing of our conversation to anyone.”

  “Oh … yes … certainly … nothing at all.”

  “T
hen thank you, sir, for your cooperation. I shall now return to Bow Street.”

  “Well, thank you, young sir, and let me say that if you do carpentry work, there’s always plenty of that round a stable. You seem a likely lad for work of any sort.”

  “Thank you, sir,” said I. “Very kind of you to say so.”

  With that, I picked up the toolbox and politely took my leave of him. Though I made my way at a brisk pace, and in the daylight ventured the shortest route to Bow Street — down Henrietta and across Co vent Garden — I dared not run, nor even proceed at a jog trot, for fear of shaking and breaking the Chinese vase that was nestled among the tools. I am not sure that I would have hurried so fast, in any case, for I considered my expedition only partly successful. I had discovered a few things, true, yet I had found no trace of blood upon the mattress, nor anywhere else in Bradbury’s upstairs quarters, for that matter; I had also missed the opportunity to summon Mr. Gurney to Bow Street to make a face-to-face identification of the horse seller (John Cutter indeed!).

  Nevertheless, I took my findings to Sir John the moment I arrived at Number 4. He was, as I expected, in his chambers, yet alone, which surprised me somewhat. I had half hoped to encounter him in the process of interrogating Roundtree or Mrs. Bradbury. He had seemed so to look forward to it. No doubt he had talked to both of them already, I told myself, made some sort of preliminary examination. After all, I had been gone near two hours.

  He bade me sit down and give my report, which I did, telling first of my visit to Bradbury’s and then of my interview with Matthew Gurney. His reactions were various. He seemed amused at the way Mrs. Bradbury had removed all trace of her husband from her bedroom, quite interested in the discovery of the Chinese vase, elated that the selling of the horse fitted well in the table of events, yet indifferent to the significance I had placed upon Mrs. Bradbury’s false name, Grace Hope. In all, he deemed my expedition a success and congratulated me upon my discoveries.