A Killing Too Far

by Andrew Wareham

  Sam started to his feet, realised there was nothing he could do – he would not survive twenty yards, dressed as prosperously as he was. The child disappeared, taken into a back alley.

  A violinist appeared, playing for pennies thrown into a hat held for him by a boy with a knife. He played for an hour until a drunk threw an empty bottle at him and he ran with his takings.

  “A dangerous way of making a living, Mr Porter.”

  “Drunks are generous, Mr Heythorne. He might have as much as five shillings in that hat.”

  They stayed till midnight, unable to risk moving from their safe place of observation, watched as another dozen fights broke out and men were stabbed and brutally beaten. At least a score could be seen collapsed and unconscious, some of them possibly to die in the mud.

  “A thousand men in total, would you say, Mr Porter?”

  “Those who stayed for any time, certainly. Probably ten times as many took one or two drinks and went home, the bulk of their wages intact. Not all are degraded, it would seem.”

  “You may well be right. What happened to the man in the alley? He seems no longer to be there.”

  Porter shook his head.

  “Dead, Mr Heythorne. He was dragged away. A pack of stray dogs. No doubt their leavings will be discovered further out of sight in the morning, unless pigs get to him first.”

  Reverend Smart broke his silence, the first time he had spoken in hours.

  “I shall pray for him, gentlemen.”

  “Pray for us all, Reverend Smart.”

  Sam made his way home from the vicarage early in the morning, unmolested for the drunks all being in a state of collapse by then. He was rarely shaken by what he had seen. The excesses of the evening had appalled him, the more so when he accepted that it had been no more than a very ordinary Saturday night. He wondered whether he could continue to distil gin to fuel such scenes, but fortunately soon realised that it was not his fault.

  ‘If I did not, another would. Closing my distilleries would merely mean others opening, and possibly of worse quality than mine; probably, in fact, for mine are of the finest. At least those poor souls will not have been poisoned by their drink. Why should I cease to take my profit, when others would? In any event, it is not my fault if the weak and depraved choose to abuse themselves by drinking to excess. What they do is their affair, I am not to be their keeper. I do not force the gin down their throats. What they are is their choice, their fault.’

  He said nothing to Josie of what he had seen, merely commenting that there was a need for extra constables in the streets. He displaced her at the desk and wrote his conclusions on what he had seen, preparing himself for a meeting with the Mayor and Burgesses of the town.

  “The problem, Your Honour, seems to be of a lack of proper authority in the streets. Had there been constables present then the worst of the disorder could have been ameliorated. It was noticeable that misconduct was in any case restricted to one small part of the centre of the town; the respectable were hardly incommoded at all. There may have been a few losses, shop windows smashed, as an example, yet the provision of iron grilles across the shopfronts would have averted that form of vandalism. It seems to me, Your Honour, that it might be simplest to provide barriers across the streets, with constables on each, to ensure that the drunkards do not stray out of their proper place. I do think that the habit of paying workers inside the public houses should be brought to an end. A bye-law forbidding the practice might be desirable. For the rest? Well… the presence of loose women is inevitable, I must imagine – it is, after all, the oldest profession! It is certainly unfortunate that the Reverend has found it essential to lock the church doors of a Saturday night, but I see no means of avoiding that expedient.”

  The burgesses were not impressed; they had looked for a more conciliatory response and for proposals from the distillery that would lead to a lessening of drunken debauchery on their streets.

  “I could close down my premises, gentlemen, but what would happen then? What happened before I opened my modern and dirt-free distilleries? Men died, were blinded, suffered paralysis from bad gin. That is not to be seen today. Close me down, sirs, and you would go back to the days of bathtub gin; of noxious, poisonous brews destroying the health of the town and ruining the productivity of the workers. The sole practical suggestion I might make would be that you should introduce some measure of licensing of the premises where gin is sold. Inspectors could ensure that glasses are cleaned and that only good alcohol is to be found and that known criminals should not frequent the bars, as owners that is. That might at least act as a protection to the health of those who choose to drink.”

  The Mayor and Burgesses talked and decided that to pass a bye-law forbidding employers to pay their men in bars might be an interference with the liberties of the individual, for, after all, if the workers did not wish to be paid thus, they could always leave their jobs. As for employing constables, that would be far too expensive; they did not exist to invent new and greater burdens on the local tax-payer, they believed.

  “Licences and inspectors might be possible, provided the system paid for itself, Mr Heythorne. We must investigate the possibility.”

  Sam smiled and made no attempt to volunteer coins from his own pocket. If they wanted order in their streets, then they could pay for it.

  He said as much to Abe later in the day when they met.

  “Tight, something-for-nothing sods they are, Uncle Abe! They want a solution, a quick and simple answer, but only if they don’t have to pay for it. I am not forking out for their benefit, that I tell you, sir.”

  “Nor you should, Sam… It might not be a bad idea to pass a few guineas across to the Lord Lieutenant, Sam. A couple of hundred into his Fund for the Preservation of Impoverished Lord Lieutenants might be sensible. He is bound to have a number of charitable funds under his control, some of which will be active in preserving the poor, more busily filling his own pockets. Any matter of law and order eventually comes to his notice, and he should be encouraged to look favourably upon us.”

  Sam agreed, reluctantly; he could not approve of paying hard-earned money into the hands of aristocratic idlers.

  “How do I go about it, Uncle Abe? I do not know the people.”

  “Neither do I… Your Captain Wakerley, Sir Charles as he now is, will be the man. He will have the contacts that we do not. Ride across and pay him a visit, Sam. Best to have the cash in your pocket when you go. Sooner rather than later, Sam. We may need the Lord Lieutenant’s favour at an early day if the Mayor cannot be trusted.”

  Sam opened his strongbox, most reluctantly, and counted twenty of the stacks of guineas into a little leather sack which he tucked inside his saddlebag. He checked the flints on his pistols and loaded them, just in case he found trouble on the road. He straddled the cob and decided that he must lay hands on something better by way of a riding horse, an animal that better suited his dignity as an up and coming man of affairs, then made his way across the moors the few miles to the Wakerley Estate.

  Sir Charles was within reason pleased to see Sam, particularly on a matter of business; Sam gained the impression that he might not have been so welcome purely as a social caller. Reasonable enough, he decided – he was not from the same part of society as his old captain.

  “Not to beat about the bush, sir, I am wishful to put a couple of hundred in gold in the Lord Lieutenant’s way. It might be wiser for me to have a friend when it comes to matters of enforcing the law of the land, and particularly keeping the streets clean and tidy on a Saturday night.”

  “I have not seen the problem for myself, Mr Heythorne. Is it very bad?”

  Sam gave a brief and much expurgated description of what he had seen.

  “Much of the problem, sir, is caused by employers paying their weekly wage in the bar of pubs they themselves own. It is difficult for a man not to have a drink with his workmates if they are there in the beerhouse already. Men who might not touch gin otherwise hav
e little choice in the matter, I suspect. The hopeless drunkards are a different matter, of course, sir. But as it stands almost every employed man in Stoke must drink every Saturday night. Some have no more than one or two, but many drink to excess, and that is the best word for the behaviour to be seen in the main street, sir. What is to be done, I know not, but I would not wish the Lord Lieutenant to take unconsidered action when petitioned to solve the problem.”

  Sir Charles agreed that all points of view must be considered.

  “I am to ride into Derby myself later in the week, Mr Heythorne, and could certainly ensure that a few guineas ended up in the right place. What sum are you considering?”

  “Two hundred, sir. Here.”

  “Literally two hundred? A sufficiency to ensure that you are listened to, Mr Heythorne. Might I suggest a similar amount at Christmas, annually, would do a lot of good and would ensure that you were not forgotten. It is the case that regiments in barracks in the county all receive a spirits issue, much as sailors do at sea. I am sure that the Colonels could be pointed in your direction for their purchases, Mr Heythorne. It is often the case that one is able to do a good turn for a friend, and the Lord Lieutenant will find two hundred guineas most amicable.”

  “I suspect I must put on a night shift, Sir Charles.”

  “Within a very few weeks, perhaps.”

  Sam was not invited to remain for a meal and was offered only a mug of small beer by way of refreshment. It was much as he would have expected – he was not the sort to grace the dinner tables of the gentry. He found himself irritated, even so, for being fairly certain that he matched Sir Charles for income and might outstrip him within a very few years.

  He made his farewell, making no attempt to issue an invitation that might be an embarrassment to Sir Charles. They were sure they would bump into each other again, and said no more.

  “Willing to take my money, Josie – nothing low or common about gold guineas – but don’t want to see me inside their doors or sleeping in their guest chambers. Got to be born to the right sort, don’t you know!”

  She shrugged – the County were what they were. They always had been convinced they were too good to mix with ordinary folk.

  “A note from Mr Rowlands, Sam. Miss Jemima Wenbury is now to be called ‘Mrs’, it would seem, and is set to enjoy her early widowhood in a cottage to the east of Nottinghamshire rather than in Derby as was originally planned for her. Mr Rowlands was able to make a purchase in the town of Newark, courtesy of a relative of some sort, and she is to make her way there this very week, tickets having been purchased on the stage coaches for the purpose. One-way tickets, I would add.”

  “Good. A very rapid farewell to that young lady. So very foolish a girl!”

  “Careless in the extreme, Sam. One notices that there is no censure of young Mr Rowlands, Sam.”

  “It is the way of the world, Josie. A man who fathers a bastard is seen as a wild young dog, carefree and adventurous; the young female who is the mother is called a whore. Not very pleasant, when you consider the matter dispassionately - which I never have, I will admit - but beyond my powers to change. Should we be so fortunate as to have sons and daughters, then no doubt they can be brought up to a better understanding, but more than that is beyond us.”

  “So it is, Sam. Far too early in our marriage for there to be any thought of offspring, but one day, I do not doubt. What are you to do next, Sam?”

  “Uncle Abe wishes me to be seen more in the town, Josie. It seems that there may be a few matters of interest that should be dealt with.”

  He said nothing more specific to her, but Abe had been rather worried.

  “I have received complaints, Sam, of burglaries of prosperous merchants of the town in the past two weeks. They do not expect that of us, we are to provide a degree of protection of our people. They must stop, Sam.”

  The following morning saw Sam in Stoke, making his way through the back streets to a pawnshop, much the same as Rufus had used to operate.

  “Jonas Blenkinsop?”

  Sam had never met the man before but had been recommended to him as a very active fence with connections through the west of the county and further north as well.

  “Mr Heythorne, sir, welcome to my premises. I cannot imagine you are here by way of business, sir, and I can assure you that I have paid my dues in full to your esteemed uncle’s collector…”

  “In fact, Jonas, I am on a matter of business, yours not mine. There have been a few, three that I know of, burglaries of well-known merchants of the town in the past two or three weeks. These men are all very close friends of my uncle, not the sort to expect to find their premises broken into. Pewter mugs, several dozen of them, and any number of flat dishes, were taken in the last such outrage – a weight that would have demanded a pony and trap at least to carry them. You might have taken them in all innocence, sir, and if that is discovered to be the case then you have nothing to fear…”

  Sam fell silent, gave Jonas a minute in which to think, to decide whether to admit to having handled the goods and to name the customer who had placed them in his hands.

  There were just four pawnbrokers in the town, and Sam knew that three of them would have contacted Abe of their own volition to check on the bona fides of obviously stolen goods. If the loot came from out of town, well and good, but they would not wish to handle anything taken from those who sheltered under Abe’s wing. It was possible that the burglar had taken his spoils to Stafford or another local town, but Jonas, the outsider who owed no loyalty, had been a sensible first call for Sam.

  “Pewterware, Mr Heythorne – he swore the load had come up from Birmingham and had been placed in his hands in payment of a debt. This was the third time he had come to me this month. The wicked man, no more than a low thief! I have a name for him, Mr Heythorne, and know him to be located in the Blue Moon inn, being in Stoke, he said, for no more than two months. The name is Porlock, sir.”

  “He gave you his location?”

  Jones tittered, he had been very clever, he thought.

  “I sent my boy to follow him, sir, for not wanting to deal with an unknown. He had a driver on the seat of the wagon he used, sir, and the boy discovered his name, too. Neither are local men.”

  Sam gave Mr Blenkinsop his thanks and congratulated him on his wisdom in being so candid, so willing to keep the King’s Peace.

  “I shall mention your name to my uncle, Mr Blenkinsop, and he will take pains to look after your interests.”

  Blenkinsop made his thanks in turn, with a sickly smile for knowing that he was to be watched very closely indeed in future, and that he might not have any future at all if he even appeared to step out of line. He was aware as well that he was now obligated to the upright man – he was not dead and therefore owed him gratitude for his restraint. That gratitude must be expressed financially, he knew; there would have to be a substantial Christmas present apiece to Sam and Abe.

  The landlord of the Blue Moon knew Sam, was a good customer in fact and was very willing to tell all he knew.

  “Mr Porlock, sir? And his man, who drives for him? Both have rooms, sir, and have paid for another week. He has said that his business here has been very profitable. Not one for early mornings, sir – we see neither before midday as a rule. The back door of the house is always open, with my man sat at it, and he tells me that Mr Porlock often returns late to his room.”

  “Does he now? I suspect that is a habit best brought to an end, landlord. Two of my people may well wish to pay a visit to Mr Porlock tonight or tomorrow morning. Tell your man that is he to give them entry, silently. If Mr Porlock is out then they will wait for him, in his room. A key would be useful.”

  “In my Jemmy’s pocket it will be, sir. Not a word to be said. Not wishing to be importunate, Mr Heythorne, sir, but will your men tidy up after themselves? It does the house no favours to have bodies and constables and Crowners about the place.”

  “They will no doubt use Mr Porlock�
��s own wagon to clear up after them. Very neat, tidy men they are. By the way, do not offer alcohol to the larger of the two, the huge man; he has no tolerance for spirits and often becomes quite upset when taken by liquor.”

  “Is that Happy Henry, sir?”

  “Why, yes, so it is. Such a quaint name, do not you think?”

  It seemed possible that the landlord was thinking of a term other than ‘quaint’, but he did not say so.

  “Jacky, there is a man naming himself ‘Porlock’, staying at the Blue Moon together with his own servant or driver. He has been engaging in burglary, out of his own home area. Remove both, if you will be so good. Tidy up behind you – I think the pigsties must be given a little extra by way of food – meat is good for the animals, I believe. There may, almost must, be a sum of money in the man’s possession, the proceeds of his crimes; these to my uncle so that he may return some of their losses to the victims.”

  “Yes, sir. Quick and simple, or do we wish to make, as you might say, an example of him?”

  “Simple and silent, Jacky. The landlord of the Blue Moon wishes to preserve the name of his house.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  “I am sure it will be, Jacky. Do keep a close eye on Happy Henry – no fires on this occasion.”

  Jacky shook his head worriedly, said that Henry had been restless of late, wanting to get out and ‘do things’.

  “Worriting it is, sir, hard to get any sleep for he might wake up in the night and go out on his own, poor lad! Don’t know what to do for the best. Still, if I let him bash this fellow Porlock he may calm down – he always feels better after he’s scragged a villain or two, sir.”