by A. M. Stuart
The gravel on the drive crunched as a ricksha turned in. Griff Maddocks jumped down and strolled up the stairs.
“Mr. Maddocks,” Harriet said. “What a surprise.”
Maddocks bowed low and handed her a bouquet of orchids from behind his back. “Surely not, Mrs. Gordon. I’m a reporter. There must be only one reason why I would be here.”
Louisa stood up, bristling like a mother cat. “If it’s Harriet’s story you want, Griff, you will have to wait. She is not up for visitors today.”
Maddocks held up his hands. “I’m jesting, Mrs. Mackenzie. I have my story from Curran. I’m here merely to inquire after Mrs. Gordon’s health, as a friend.”
Harriet smiled at him. “Thank you, Griff. I’m quite well.”
Maddocks tipped his hat. “I’m delighted to hear it.” He hesitated as if expecting an invitation to sit down and join them for tea but one glance at Louisa’s pursed lips dissuaded him of such a hope. “Now I’m satisfied that you have survived in one piece, I will take my leave and hope that next time I see you it will be in more pleasant circumstances. Perhaps another musical evening, Mrs. Mackenzie?”
“I rather think it will be a long time before I set foot in the Van Wijk again,” Louisa said with a theatrical shudder. The two women watched him leave, with a backward wave to them, as the ricksha turned into St. Thomas Walk.
“Louisa, I could have invited him for a cup of tea,” Harriet reproved.
Louisa turned to look at her. “It starts with a cup of tea . . . Are you blind, my dear? I think he is more than a little sweet on you.”
Harriet fussed at the petals of the pretty purple orchid. “You’re being ridiculous, Louisa,” she said. “We’re just friends. Sea journeys tend to do that. And, of course, I’m an interesting story.”
Louisa huffed out a laugh. “Curran . . . Maddocks? You will have half the eligible men in Singapore beating a path to your door, Harriet.”
Harriet made a pretense of rescuing Shashti from the lacy ruffles of her skirt but in her mind she saw Curran’s smile in the firelight and remembered how he had taken her in his arms. She could not imagine the dapper Griff Maddocks, still damp from a fight to the death in the shallows of the river, carrying a half-conscious woman into a police station.
“I don’t believe Inspector Curran falls into the category of ‘eligible men,’ Louisa,” she chided, not without regret.
Curran belonged heart and soul to someone else, the mysterious Li An. She saw it in his eyes when he had spoken of her. She would like to meet Li An.
FORTY-EIGHT
Long after Julian and Harriet had retired for the night, they were woken by the sound of furious knocking on the front door. Harriet’s heart jumped to her throat as memories of John Lawson and Zaw’s intrusion into her house came flooding back. Julian, wearing his dressing gown, answered the door with a bravado Harriet certainly did not feel as she lingered at the door to her bedroom, ready to flee.
She could hear a hastily exchanged conversation and Julian came hurrying down the corridor.
“Get dressed, Harri. It’s Euan’s driver. Euan’s sent a message to say Lawson won’t make it through the night and he has asked to see us.”
Harriet pulled on a simple cotton frock and tied her hair loosely at the nape of her neck. She had no time for anything else and was still lacing her boots in the motor vehicle as the driver took to the deserted roads at a breakneck pace.
In the quiet of the Singapore General Hospital, they were directed to a private room, easily found by the constable stationed outside in the corridor. Inside the small room, a single gas lamp cast a warm glow across the man’s face but not even that forgiving light could hide imminent death. Harriet had seen it often enough to recognize it in John Lawson’s sunken face. His eyes were closed.
The windows stood wide open and a gentle night breeze ruffled Euan Mackenzie’s graying hair as he stood at the foot of the bed, contemplating his patient. Mackenzie’s gaze was stern and professional. A nurse, crisp and cool in her uniform, waited with her hands folded, in a corner of the room.
“How long?” Harriet asked.
Mac shook his head. “A matter of hours, no more. He asked to see Curran too. I’ll go and wait for him. Can I leave you with him?”
Harriet pulled up a chair and sat down, closing her fingers around the man’s left hand, which lay outside the coverlet. Where his right arm should have been the bedclothes lay flat and undisturbed.
Julian opened the small case he had brought with him in which he carried the sacrament for the visitation of the sick and for last rites. He took out his stole, kissed the embroidered cross and hung the stole around his neck. He took a second chair on the other side of the bed and folded his hands in prayer.
They sat in the silence of the room, listening to the gentle sounds of the tropical night that drifted in through the open window. Within the room, the only sound was the dying man’s labored breathing.
Euan returned with Curran, both men slipping quietly into the room. Despite the lateness of the hour, Curran was in uniform, his helmet under his arm. Harriet wondered if he had still been at work.
They nodded to each other.
Lawson’s eyes flickered open. “Is Curran here?”
“I am,” Curran replied.
John Lawson licked his dry, cracked lips and his fingers tightened on Harriet’s. “I don’t have long,” he said. “And I can’t go to meet Annie without making a full confession.”
Curran glanced at Julian.
“God has forgiven him. I think he means your sort of confession,” Julian said, and relinquished his chair.
Curran took out his notebook and drew up the chair beside the bed. “Go on.”
Lawson looked around the room that suddenly felt full of people. “Just Mrs. Gordon, her brother and the policeman,” he said.
Mac nodded to the nurse, and although she pursed her lips in disapproval, she followed him out of the room in a crackle of starched apron.
Lawson took a shuddering breath and began with a rambling justification of his involvement in the ruby-smuggling venture, adding nothing to what he had already told Harriet of his gambling addiction and Newbold’s blackmail. Curran took notes, asking questions when he felt they were needed.
Lawson paused, struggling for breath, and Harriet raised his head, holding a beaker of water to his lips. The man took a few sips and fell back on the pillows.
“You make a good nurse, Mrs. Gordon,” Curran said.
“Not my chosen profession,” she replied, “but I learned a few things in my time in India.”
A professional nurse would have stopped the conversation, claiming the patient was exhausted, but Harriet just placed her hand on Lawson’s face, forcing him to look up at her. They had so little time.
“Go on, John, the inspector is waiting.”
Lawson swallowed and turned his head to look at Curran. “Write this down, Inspector. I, John Alfred Lawson, hereby confess to the murder of Oswald Newbold.” His breath came in ragged, uneven gasps. “I had a meeting with Newbold that night. I thought it was to pay me for the last shipment but when I arrived the man was in a rage. He was going on about treachery and betrayal. I had no idea what he was talking about but he made it clear he saw me as implicated and when I asked for my money he refused. I was desperate; I needed that money to pay the school fees, but he just laughed at me, called me a useless fool.” He paused, his eyes closing as his throat worked with emotion and the effort of speaking. “I had my knife with me, the one I use to test the rubber trees. I didn’t mean to kill him but he fought back and he wouldn’t die . . . He got my knife off me.” The man’s voice choked and he raised his hand, covering his eyes as if he could still see Newbold lying on the carpet. “So, I picked up the knife he kept on the table in his study.”
He struggled for breath, the onlookers wa
iting in horrified silence as he composed himself.
“I’d never killed a man before. It was horrible.” He frowned, his face puckering in distress. “Then his servant appeared at the door. I knew he had recognized me so I chased him out into the kitchen and finished him there. He didn’t deserve to die.” His head turned on the pillow and his hand lifted toward Harriet. “It shouldn’t have been you to find the body, Harriet. I’m so—”
“If you’re going to apologize again, I will leave,” Harriet retorted, but she took the hand he held out for her. “What a damnable mess, John,” she said softly.
Lawson turned to look back at Curran. “I returned to the study. His safe was open so I took all the money I could find”—he paused—“and the sapphire. I knew where he kept it, in the base of the statue. That was my payment for everything I had done for that man. I didn’t think anyone else knew about it. I was wrong. That’s it, Inspector. The rest you know. I’m a thief, a gambler and an adulterer but until that night I’d never killed another man. I deserve to hang,” Lawson said in a voice so soft that Harriet hardly made out the words.
The man’s eyes closed and the shallow rise and fall of his chest stopped.
But even as Curran leaned forward, Lawson’s eyes sprang open. “I can write a deathbed will, can’t I?”
Curran looked first at Harriet and then at Julian. “I suppose so. You just need two witnesses.”
Lawson took a deep shuddering breath and began to cough, blood bubbling at his lips. Harriet wiped the blood away.
“What do you need, John?”
“The doctor. I need him to be a witness. Curran can write it down and I’ll sign it.”
Harriet found the doctor waiting in the corridor and admitted him into the room.
Euan stood quietly as John Lawson said in a clear voice, “William needs a loving home. God knows I have been a poor parent for him. My sister-in-law has seven children and only agreed to take him on condition he spend his holidays in the school. That’s no life for a child.” He turned his head, seeking Harriet. “Harriet, Mrs. Gordon, I am asking you and your brother as good Christians, which I’m not, if you would become William’s guardians.”
Harriet gasped. “John, do you know what you are asking?”
His fingers tightened on hers. “I know he’s not your son, Harriet. He can’t replace your son but he likes you and you like him. I know you do. I owe you a debt of deepest gratitude for everything you did for him, when we were—” He closed his eyes as a spasm of pain contorted his face. “I know you would do for him what I have singularly failed. Give him a home with people who love him and will keep him from harm.”
Harriet looked across at her brother, the question unspoken between them but perfectly understood. Julian nodded.
Harriet bent her head to hide the tears that sprang into her eyes. “We would be honored to have Will as our ward,” she said.
Lawson’s breathing had become rapid. He looked at Curran. “Write it in your notebook, as my last will I leave everything to William and appoint Reverend Edwards as trustee of my estate and he and Mrs. Gordon as guardians of my son.”
Curran glanced at Harriet. “Do you know what you’re agreeing to?” he whispered.
She nodded. “I do and I undertake it of my own free will.”
“There’s a little money but not much. Write that, Curran,” Lawson said. His eyes were bright now and he anxiously plucked at the sheets with his hand. “It’s a lot to ask . . .”
Harriet placed her hand over his, stilling it. “Rest easy, John. I shall care for William as if he were my Thomas.”
Curran looked down at his notebook. “Mackenzie, I think you and I can witness this document.”
Lawson barely had the strength to sign his name but the rough document was duly formalized.
“God knows what a court will make of it,” Mac said.
Curran shook his head. “It’s irregular but perfectly legal.”
Lawson fell back on the pillows. “Thank you,” he said in a voice that held no strength. His eyes closed. “I think I can go now. Reverend?”
Julian opened the Book of Common Prayer. The words for the ministration of the dying brought a strange calm to the room, as everyone bowed their heads and Julian administered the last rites.
“O Almighty God, with Whom do live the spirits of just men made perfect, after they are delivered from their earthly prisons; we humbly commend the soul of this Thy servant, our dear brother, into Thy hands, as into the hands of a faithful Creator, and most merciful Savior; most humbly beseeching Thee that it may be precious in Thy sight . . . ” Julian concluded and looked down at the man who lay still, his eyes closed, his face now untroubled by worldly care.
Mac crossed to the bedside and picked up the man’s hand, checking for his pulse. He shook his head. “He’s gone. Bad business, Curran.”
Curran rose to his feet. “As he has just confessed to murder, better this way than at the end of a rope, Mac.”
FORTY-NINE
Friday, 18 March 1910
Curran had a visitor waiting for him in his office the following morning. Carruthers sat on the bench outside Curran’s office, a neat bowler hat resting on his knee. He jumped to his feet as Curran unlocked the door to his office.
“You’re very late, Inspector,” the man complained.
Curran glared at him. “As I can count the number of hours’ sleep I’ve had in the last forty-eight on the fingers of one hand, I would thank you not to provoke me further, Carruthers. What can I do for you?”
Carruthers pushed into the office and set his hat down on the desk. “My name is Symes,” he said. “I would thank you to address me correctly.”
“Very well, Mr. Symes, what do you want?”
“I’ve come to collect the rubies,” he said. “The syndicate wishes to convey its thanks to you for their safe recovery.”
Curran sat down behind his desk and, the fingers of his right hand tapping a soft tattoo on the blotter, he contemplated the agent. Curran had not forgotten, or forgiven, the man’s obstruction. If Symes had confided in him at the start of the investigation, the result could have been quite different. Instead the pompous oaf had thought he could solve the mystery of the rubies by himself.
“Apart from the fact the rubies are evidence,” he said, “I will be happy to hand them over to you on conclusive proof that they are the rightful property of the Burmese Ruby Syndicate.”
Symes blinked at him. “But of course they are . . .”
“But can you prove it?”
“Yes . . . well, of course . . . I’m sure.”
“I’ll make it simple for you, Symes. These are stones that Newbold secreted away before they were catalogued or whatever it is you do to rubies. The syndicate may, quite justifiably, feel that the stones are their property but as far as I can see they can produce no direct proof that they were in fact mined from syndicate mines in Burma.”
Symes straightened. “We can do chemical analysis . . .”
“Not sure that proves anything except they came from the same general area. No, Mr. Symes, the rubies remain in my custody until the trial, and after that, in the absence of any evidence to the contrary, His Majesty’s grateful government will put them to good use. I am sure the royal regalia requires a new jewel or two.”
“This is outrageous,” Symes snapped, jumping to his feet with such force the chair fell to the floor with a clatter.
Curran shrugged. “I’ve work to do. Good day to you, Mr. Symes.”
Symes flounced out, slamming the door behind him. Curran smiled at the still-wavering door. Symes had not mentioned the sapphire. He might eventually get back the rubies but the sapphire would indeed go to the government and help replenish His Majesty’s coffers.
Curran called for Singh to join him.
“Sergeant, the young police cons
table at Changi Village, Musa bin Osman. The boy has promise. I would like you to do the paperwork to have him brought to our branch on a three-month trial.”
Singh nodded. “He did well,” he agreed. “If that is what he wishes then I concur, sir.”
Singh saluted and turned sharply on his heel, almost colliding with Cuscaden. Curran sprang to his feet as the inspector general entered the office and shut the door behind him.
“Sir, what are you . . . can I get you a cup of tea?”
Cuscaden waved a hand, signaling for Curran to sit. “I won’t stay. Just wanted to say that was a damned fine job on the rubies and the vases too. Well done.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Cuscaden’s moustache twitched. “But if I read that illegible scrawl that passes for your report correctly, the matter of Sir Oswald Newbold’s murder remains unresolved?”
Curran’s hand closed over the notebook in the pocket of his jacket and he made a decision. “I do not believe Van Gelder or Kent was responsible for the death of Newbold and his servant. I am left with the conclusion that Newbold was murdered by an intruder.” He heaved a sigh. “But I will, of course, continue to make inquiries.”
Cuscaden tutted. “The coroner won’t be pleased. A verdict of death by person or persons unknown is never satisfactory but at least we’ll see someone swing for the murder of the young Dutch boy.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Carry on,” Cuscaden said as he turned for the door.
“Sir, before you go . . . I have a proposal I wish to put to you.”
Cuscaden listened to Curran’s proposal. He harrumphed and tutted but in the end agreed and, shaking his head, left the room.
Curran waited until his superior had left the department before opening his notebook to Lawson’s confession. He thought not of Newbold but of the innocent old man who had been in the wrong place. His murderer had died a ghastly death. Justice had been served. Nyan could rest in peace.
He tore the pages from his notebook and under the pretense of lighting his pipe, he set fire to the pages, dropping them into his rubbish bin.