The Thieves' Labyrinth (Albert Newsome 3)

by McCreet, James

  And as Mr Newsome ventured through the dock to locate the man known only as Baudrons, his questions to dock workers about the fellow were met with either utter ignorance of a ‘cat master’ or a smirking oddness that made the inspector increasingly curious. Directed finally to a rather dilapidated wooden building with grimy windows, he rapped on a weather-worn door using a knocker in the likeness of a cat’s face.

  ‘Mr Baudrons?’ he called. ‘It is the Thames Police. I have some few questions for you. May I enter?’

  No sound came from within.

  Mr Newsome turned the handle and pushed the door. It was not locked, so he entered.

  An unspeakable smell assailed his nostrils the moment he stepped inside: a sharp compost of ammonia, stale fish and some unidentifiable feral scent that evoked damp hair or the smell of the gallery at a low theatre. There was no light except from the filth-encrusted windows and he was forced to shuffle tentatively down a corridor with one hand against the wall.

  ‘Mr Baudrons? I found the door was unlocked . . . I am Inspector Newsome of the Thames Police. Are you here?’

  Still no response from inside the building.

  The smell became stronger, catching at his throat and causing his eyes to water as he ventured nearer to a dark room at the corridor’s end. He tried to breathe more through his mouth and, as his eyes became more accustomed to the dimness, he saw that dozens of cats were silently pacing the floor around him.

  A curious sound seemed to emanate from a room ahead:

  ‘Heeeere.’

  Mr Newsome made his way through the prowling cats and came to a room that was in almost total darkness. Only the flames from the grate gave out a flickering illumination that showed perhaps ten more cats lying before it in various states of languorous prostration. The smell here was at its most powerful, inflected with the boiled-meat odour of whatever was simmering in a tin pot above the fire.

  ‘Heeeere.’

  Mr Newsome looked for the source of the sound but the room seemed not to be inhabited by any sentient being. Instead, there were more cats: cats peering back at him from shelves; cats populating a sagging old sofa; cats wheedling about his ankles; cats seemingly spilling from every surface. Tails twitched into question marks and whiskers quivered as small noses investigated their investigator. From somewhere in the building came the warbling cry of a rutting female.

  ‘Heeeere: on the ssofa.’

  Mr Newsome stared where bidden and saw a human arm rise from a writhing multiplicitous pelt of dormant felines. Lying at full length, the man was all but covered with the animals, his heavily bearded face emerging from the fur as an incongruously human element. In the shadows, it was not clear whether the sable mass atop his head was his hair or yet another slumbering cat.

  ‘I am seeking Mr Baudrons. I presume you are he.’

  ‘They call me sso. Won’t you ssit?’ The arm indicated a straight-backed wooden chair by the sofa.

  Mr Newsome pulled the chair closer to the reclining form, wondering what manner of deformity or affliction caused the fellow to hiss so. In the half-light, the man’s features were limited to hair and eyes. As he sat, a cat jumped up onto his legs with a warble and he brushed it off with an irritable backhanded swipe.

  ‘Sshow ssome resspect for my ssoldierz, won’t you?’

  ‘I am not fond of cats, sir. Nor dogs, if pressed on the matter. I like animals only inasmuch as they feed me.’

  ‘If you would sspeak with me, you will resspect Jeremiah’z mood.’

  Baudrons appeared to nod assent to the cat named Jeremiah, which then ventured another leap onto the visiter’s lap and began to paw at his trousers preparatory to settling for a nap. Mr Newsome pursed his lips and resisted the urge to swiftly open his legs. Meanwhile, another be-whiskered specimen viewed him suspiciously from the nearby table edge.

  ‘Mr Baudrons – there was an incident last night at the Queen’s Pipe and I have been informed that you are often on patrol about the dock at night. Exactly what is the nature of your role as “cat master”?’

  ‘Ratz!’

  At this word, a palpable shiver of awareness went through the room, ears twitching and drooping eyes flickering open for an instant lest the common enemy skitter audaciously across the boards.

  ‘You are a rat-catcher? Well, I suppose every dock must have one, but—’

  ‘Not I – my troopz! I feed them; I care for them; I train them to combat their foe: the R-A-T. They are the workerz; I merely esscort them about the vaultz and sstoreroomz that I might collect the long-tailed cadaverz my ssoldierz leave behind. Admittedly, I do alsso catch live onez for the fightss.’

  ‘I see. And in your nocturnal duty last night, did you see or hear anything unusual at the tobacco warehouse? I am sure you have heard about the discovery there.’

  ‘A terrible buzinesss. It waz Jethro alerted me to the horror.’

  ‘Jethro? Who is Jethro?’

  ‘He ssitz to your left – on the table there.’

  Mr Newsome turned to look at the cat named Jethro: a battle-scarred ginger tom with a leonine head, gnawed ears, one empty eye socket and a single yellow fang protruding from a mouth set in baleful disapproval. Policeman and tom exchanged a stare of mutual distrust.

  ‘Old Jethro is my finesst ratter. He will take on the big-gunz – almosst az big az himsself ssometimez. Quite fearlesss iz Jethro. He called to me at the Pipe: called me to ssee.’

  ‘He . . . called you?’

  ‘O yess – all of the ssoldierz will call me when they make a kill or find ssomething of note. Izn’t that right, Jethro?’

  Jethro gave a dry creak of a meow to his master, evidently in the affirmative.

  ‘In thiss casse, it waz the body – or rather the legz. I believe Jethro had a little lick at the sstumpz – he likess his meat well done.’

  ‘So – let me understand this: you found the body during the night but reported it to nobody? You allowed your cats to desecrate the remains and returned here leaving the outrage to be found by others?’

  ‘Rodentz are my buzinesss, ssir – not dead bodiez.’

  ‘I see. Did you – or perhaps Jethro – hear or see anything thereabouts that made you suspicious? A strange sound? A strange smell?’

  ‘Well, now you mention it, ssir, the catz were ssomewhat odd lasst night: more tentative than uzual. They sstayed closser to me than is their habit. Perhaps it waz the ssmell.’

  ‘The smell of the burning body?’

  ‘No, ssir – the ssmell of the ssewerz. It waz quite powerful lasst night.’

  ‘Really? Is it common that you can smell the sewers here within the dock?’

  ‘Not common, no. Ssometimez in the fog . . . ssometimez if the wind iz from the easst. On my honour, I have never ssmelled it az bad az lasst night.’

  ‘Are you sure it was the sewers? Might not it have been, for example, a man who had the smell of drains about him?’

  ‘That iz posssible, but my catz fear no man and they were unuzually sskittish.’

  ‘Is it conceivable that there was a man, or men, inside the warehouse at the same time as you and your cats?’

  ‘Doubtful, ssir. What man do you know who iz sstealthier than a cat?’

  Mr Newsome pondered what he was hearing and looked once again around the malodorous room that seemed to undulate with silent fur. Fiery eyes blinked back at him and countless nostrils explored his scent. A quick glance to his left showed him that Jethro was evidently still unimpressed.

  ‘Mr Baudrons – you are clearly something of an authority on cats. Do you know anything about the larger variety: tigers, jaguars and the like?’

  ‘One cat iz much like another. Ssome are larger. Were Jethro az big az a lion, I dare ssay he would be a veritable monsster.’

  ‘No doubt. Some say that there may be such animals loose in the city – escapees from menageries or the docks. What do you make of that?’

  ‘It would not ssurprize me a jot, ssir. There are ssigns. I have
lost catz to the ssewerz. They go in there out of curiossity, az catz will do, and never return – or return injured. If you don’t believe me, witnesss Judith. Judith? Where are you, girl?’

  A throaty trill came from near the fire and a creature roused itself from the hearth to approach the cat-ridden sofa. If its gait was curiously lop-sided, closer inspection showed its rear right leg and tail to be entirely absent.

  ‘Sshe went down the ssewerz along Wapping and came out like that. I thought sshe would die, but the dock ssurgeon ssaved her. I have retired her now.’

  ‘Am I right in thinking that no rat could take a leg like that?’

  ‘No rat that I ever knew of, ssir.’

  ‘Do you know that certain mudlarks believe there to be a monster that emerges from the sewers?’

  ‘I may have heard az much.’

  ‘Mr Baudrons – I would like to show you something.’ Mr Newsome took the tooth out of his breast pocket and held it up in the firelight that the cat master might see it.

  Jethro smelled it first, however, and let forth a terrifying hiss, his back arching and his hair standing up in a quite alarming manner. The flames shone in his single eye and Mr Newsome made to move away for his own safety.

  ‘Calm down, Jethro!’ said Baudrons, pulling himself into a sitting position.

  Cats tumbled from him amid much protestation and his fuller form became more visible: a man no more than five feet tall and with a dark beard that extended to his breast. A number of his teeth also seemed to be missing. He reached out a grubby hand to take the tooth from Mr Newsome.

  ‘Interessting. It doz indeed sseem to be a feline tooth. Big one, too.’

  ‘Could an animal of that size survive alone in the city? Mr Baudrons? In the sewers perhaps?’

  ‘There are ratz a-plenty in the ssewerz . . . the occazional tosher, perhaps . . . sslopz from the sslaughterhouzez – aye, there iz no doubt ssusstenance enough. Sstill, I would be ssurprized if ssuch a beasst could lasst without a man to take care of it.’

  ‘Intriguing.’ Mr Newsome put the tooth back in his pocket. ‘There is one final thing. We have not discussed the bodies in the spirit vaults. I believe that men may have entered it unofficially at some time in the last fortnight. Have you seen or heard, or smelled, anything untoward in your duties during that period?’

  ‘In truth, I have not. I am but one man and fifty catz; I cannot be everywhere, even if my ssoldierz can be. In fact, I rather ssusspect that my job and yourz have more than a few ssimlaritiez in that resspect.’

  ‘Really.’

  ‘Why, yes: we sseek a foe by sstealth. We look for cluez to his exisstenz and venture into his lairz that we may know hiz wayz. We musst almosst become like him, don’t you think?’

  ‘If you say so.’

  ‘I do, ssir. Indeed, I ssee that you purssue an enemy: a clever foe who, like the R-A-T, is a masster of his art. He lurkz; he watchez; he sstrikess when the hour of ssilence is upon the world – in darknesss.’

  ‘And how would you, with your particular wisdom, recommend that I catch this foe?’

  ‘In the same way I do, ssir: with a higher intelligence, by lying in wait where your enemy will be, by luring him, by making him confident. A big rat will kill a cat, but the cat who knowz hiz foe always triumphz. Look at Jethro there: a proud ssoldier!’

  Tomcat and detective again shared a glance of mutual distrust.

  ‘I see. Well, I thank you, Mr Baudrons. That has been most edifying.’

  Preparatory to standing, Mr Newsome opened his legs swiftly and watched with barely disguised satisfaction as the dozing Jeremiah started awake and dropped to the floor.

  ‘You are unkind, ssir,’ said the cat master with a disapproving tone.

  The inspector was about to offer a riposte when a spray of reeking urine spattered against his left shoulder. He turned to see Jethro strolling slowly away with a one-eyed parting glare, his final comment delivered.

  Outside in the stark daylight, Mr Newsome breathed the relatively pure air of the dock and dabbed disgustedly at his coat with a handkerchief. He could not remember having visited such an unpleasant place as part of an investigation (though he would very shortly change his opinion on that point).

  The case of the Aurora – initially something of a minor curiosity – was becoming odder with every step. By this stage, he would normally expect a pattern to be emerging: the merest glimpse of a trail to be followed, but a glimpse all the same. Here, the detective was presented only with a clutch of disjointed pieces. Indeed, it was almost as if clues were being left wilfully to confuse an investigator.

  There was the tooth, of course, which might or might not have bearing on the body of the first mate dragged from the river. Certainly nothing else about the corpse offered any further aid as to the circumstances of his death. Had he died at the same time as his fellows who later found themselves sealed up in barrels?

  And what of those bodies in barrels? There seemed little doubt that they would be revealed as the missing mariners of the Aurora – those who had remained after the tidewaiter was taken on board. But why the risk, the ingenuity and the sheer horror of entombing them thus when their discovery was certain? If such conspicuous shock was the aim, it had most likely succeeded – but to what end and with what audience in mind? Was it a warning? Was it a perverse expression of malice? Or was it a threat made real?

  On the latter point, at least the death of Josiah Timbs (whose shoes were indeed quite suggestive of identity) might be linked to the letter he had been sent. What had it said? Take your insurance and be content. If you do not heed this warning, you will be sorry. It had clearly been no idle threat, but again: why the public horror, the stealthy illegality of entering the dock at night, the outrageous theatricality of it all?

  Eldritch Batchem – the man’s name could not be kept separate from the events. His very absence from the dock that day was perhaps the most suspicious fact of all – this man who seemed to live upon the stage and the page of popular interest. If ever there was a case to truly set the man’s name down in investigative lore, this would be the one.

  Then there was the most curious, and perhaps the most significant puzzle of all: the noisome little man who had leapt from the police galley two days previously. Why had he been watching Mr Newsome, and on whose behalf? Why had he chosen the cold and filthy embrace of the Thames rather than a gaol cell? And how did one explain the sewer smell described by Baudrons if indeed the little man had drowned (as he surely must have with the irons about his wrists).

  As for Mr Williamson, he was obviously pursuing the case with vigour – and contrary to the document he had signed in Sir Richard’s office if Noah’s constant presence was to be correctly understood. Evidently they had already investigated the Waterloo-bridge incident and the receivers of illicit silk merchandise. What was next? In his previous role, Mr Newsome would have had them followed, but now he was handcuffed by the loathsome uniform of the Thames Police.

  And, again, he cursed his inability to follow first hand the investigation at the tobacco warehouse and the spirit vault. His erstwhile colleagues at the Detective Force were good men, but they lacked his tenacity, his fire, his latitude in interpreting the letter of the law.

  Amid such a chaos of clues, there seemed to be only one common strand, one clear course of action. And it lay in the sewers.

  SEVENTEEN

  The extent of the public hunger in those following days for details of the London Dock murders can hardly be conceived. In the lesser journals and street scandal sheets, hastily sketched images of the spirit-blanched barrel corpses and the half-baked legs of Josiah Timbs (who had indeed been proved to be the corpse) had people crowding around the street patterers to pay their penny for a twin tale of terror. Even in the better newspapers, each detail was sought and discussed with a degree of attention more often reserved for the coronation or death of a monarch. None, it seemed, could resist the delicious horror and the commercial significance of the d
eaths, which together contributed the ingredients of a perfect story.

  Indeed, as an iron rod upon a church spire attracts the bolt from the aether and channels it to the earth with crackling fury, so the Aurora case became the new focus of the current investigative mania. Everybody, it seemed, in every club and on every omnibus, had thoughts upon the matter and discussed them at length. Constables, meanwhile – more often figures of derision or distrust – quite revelled in their new attractiveness to a population positively galvanized to know more.

  It was, in short, a situation highly fortuitous for a man of my talents. I could barely produce enough articles, opinions and quasi-fictitious eye-witness accounts from my cell at Horsemonger-lane, and each day saw an almost constant parade of printers’ boys to and from my small table. All the while, news came to me from these canny lads and from the visiters of other debtors, who were quite giddy with the novelty of the latest great murders.

  ‘Have you heard?’ said young Charles, that garrulous demi-relative to our worn tailor Burley. ‘Have you heard about the shocking murders at London Dock?’

  ‘O yes,’ said Burley, himself seeing only the benefits of a fatal immersion in brandy.

  And as I wrote nearer to my release from debt, the dramatis personae of the notable case itself were engaged in various activities across our great city . . .

  John Cullen was grievously tired. For the last few mornings, and according to his own suggestion at Mr Williamson’s house, he had been attending the crush of hopeless humanity that gathered before the London Dock at seven-thirty each day that they might be permitted to work themselves into exhaustion for the price of a few more days’ reprieve from hunger.

  As a big man, he was able to push his way to the front of the crowd at the gates and had been fortunate enough to be chosen each day by the calling foreman (who, in truth, required many more men due to the persistent north-easterlies). At least, Mr Cullen was ‘fortunate’ if that word described the opportunity to blister one’s feet in the crane wheel, risk one’s fingers in the winches or strain one’s back moving cargo upon the wheeled trucks. He had so far ventured his hand at all such endeavours, and liked none.