Children of Fire

by Paul CW Beatty

  ‘Thank you, Mr Johnstone,’ said Josiah. Then he and Michael started to walk towards the forge.

  To Josiah the destruction became more shocking the closer he got. Only two days ago every tool had its place, now they had been flung over most of the ground in front of the shattered building. He spotted the hammer that McBrinnie used on the pickaxe blade at his last visit. Quite close by there was the small vice that had held his handcuffs as McBrinnie had repaired them. The only thing that seemed in the same place was the large anvil, so heavy that even the explosion had been insufficient to move it. Merriman was crouched down examining the floor about where the hearth must have been. He looked up at Josiah.

  ‘Over ’ere, lad.’ There was a blackened hole in the floor the shape of bowl. It was a bout two foot deep at its centre and six feet wide. ‘This is where it ’appened.’

  To Josiah it did not seem anywhere near dramatic enough to have caused the destruction around him. ‘Is that all there is?’ he said.

  ‘The bang when it went off were big enough.’

  ‘But the hole is so smooth. Wasn’t the charge drilled into the floor?’

  ‘Apparently not’, said the laconic Merriman. ‘If it had been then the hole would be deeper and there’d be rock and lumps of earth everywhere.’

  So how do you know it was here the explosion occurred?’

  ‘It’s the only sign of an explosion and you can see ’ow all the debris radiates from here. Then there’s the body.’

  Merriman got up and led Josiah outside to where McBrinnie lay covered by a sheet. Michael had raised a corner and was looking at him. Merriman and Josiah joined him.

  McBrinnie was in an horrific condition. Even dead and tortured, Elijah had still looked himself; McBrinnie’s corpse was unrecognisable. The face was purplish red and black. Patches of skin were missing, leaving seared flesh showing through. The lips had shrunk back from the teeth in a bloody mass. One eye had melted and most of the hair was burned away.

  ‘How could the charge that made that hole do all this to a man’s body?’ asked a stunned Josiah.

  ‘As I see it wasn’t the charge as such that did this,’ said Merriman. The explosion threw all the red ‘ot coals from the hearth into his face. I think he was standing over the hearth when it went off.’

  Merriman reached inside the sheet and pulled one of McBrinnie’s hands into the light. ‘Look here, see ’ow this hand is pitted and blackened. It’s his right hand.’ He turned it over so that they could see the palm. ‘See ‘ow it’s burnt back and front.

  ‘I’m guessing from what I have heard from Mr Johnstone that McBrinnie ’ad come in ’ere before Johnstone talked to him, to get the fire in the hearth going for the day’s work. The men who helped get the body out said McBrinnie had been delayed this morning by having to go to see one of the horses at the stables down the hill. Knowing ’im, he’d have been impatient to get on but ’e would ’ave ’ad to get the hearth working first. Like as not he’d ’ave would have put a few bits of coal on the embers from yesterday, if they weren’t ’ot enough. When they were lit he’d have added more and given them a few puffs from the bellows. Then ’e’d ’ave left it to heat up proper like.’

  Merriman replaced McBrinnie’s right hand and pulled out the left, which was not as badly burned; the palm was intact. ‘When ’e came back from seeing Johnstone, the coals should ‘ave been glowing well. He’d ’ave taken the rake in his right hand and started to smooth them out. With his left hand he grasped the bellow’s chain and pumped to get the temperature up. I think that was when it happened. ’Is left hand was further away from the hearth so it wasn’t as badly burned. But the right hand was over the coals ’olding the rake and got the full force.’

  ‘I don’t doubt you, Mr Merriman, but do you mind if Michael and I look to see if there’s a shot hole you’ve missed?’

  ‘Go ahead. In fact I’ll help you. Three sets of eyes are better than one.’

  Josiah reasoned that if there was a shot hole then it might have been under something large, to hide it. There would have been time to put a charge in place while McBrinnie was at the stables. The most straightforward way of setting off the charge was a fast fuse, like the ones he’d seen Merriman use in the mine. If the fuse had been run out of the building, the murderer could have waited until McBrinnie came back and just lit the fuse.

  So they looked where larger objects had been. The oil in the case-hardening trough had been ignited by the explosion leaving a black sticky residue on the floor. But there was no sign of a shot hole let alone a crater. They even moved the large anvil in case it concealed where the fuse might have been anchored but there was no sign of a fuse run, though they did find the badly bent rack from the hearth nearby.

  ‘It must have been thrown against one of the beams and come down inside instead of being blown through the roof,’ remarked Michael.

  Josiah even examined the outside surface of the walls that were left standing. A fuse lit from outside, might leave burn marks on the stone but there were none.

  After about half an hour’s searching they had found nothing that undermined Merriman’s initial thoughts that the charge had exploded under the hearth. In fact finding the battered rack supported Merriman’s conjecture; if that was where the explosion had been, the rack would have been more likely to go straight up and then fall back inside the forge.

  ‘Could the charge have been strapped to the bottom of the hearth itself?’ asked Michael.

  ‘That would be very risky if the hearth were too ’ot when you placed it and unpredictable in that even if fitted successfully, it could go off at any time,’ said Merriman.

  Unpredictable, Josiah turned over the word Merriman had used. If passing on the nail to McBrinnie had precipitated the murder then the target was McBrinnie himself and no one else. If that was the case then the charge had to be triggered by McBrinnie and it seemed that the thing McBrinnie would have been operating when the explosion occurred was the bellows.

  ‘Could you mount the charge on the bellows so that it would go off when McBrinnie operated them?’ he asked.

  ‘In theory I suppose you could,’ said Merriman.

  ‘But how would you light the fuse?’ asked Michael. ‘Mr Merriman, could it be lit by touching on the bottom of the hearth?’

  ‘Well it would be hot enough if the fuse were reliable enough.’

  Josiah pondered aloud. ‘Could the fuse used with the Furness Vale Blasting Cartridges be lit in that way?’

  Merriman thought for a bit. ‘I think it might but the cartridges are relatively small.’

  Michael frowned. ‘I have heard the navy use things called bombards on ships. They fire big cannon balls with gunpowder in them that explode. Would they cause this much damage?’

  ‘They’re called mortar shells,’ said Merriman. ‘They’re powerful enough but even the smallest of them contain twenty pounds of powder and have a thick metal casing. They would be too big to get under the hearth assuming you could get one up here without anyone noticing.’

  ‘How thick is the metal casing?’ asked Josiah.

  ‘Probably an inch or so. Really can’t say.’

  Josiah remembered when he had felt the weight of the blasting charges in Mr Bridges office. Then he’d thought they weighed about a pound and a half each. In the mine Merriman had told him, he thought the cartridges were five to six times more powerful than their equivalent in loose powder. If those two estimates were anything like accurate, a grenade with the equivalent explosive powder of a naval shell could be made with two or three blasting cartridges if packed into metal casings about an inch thick. Such a grenade would be small enough to fit below the hearth.

  ‘If you had a something like a naval shell but small enough to fit, could you using a fuse linked to the bellows mechanism to set it off?’

  ‘Say that again?’ said Merriman.

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nbsp; ‘Could you place several grenades under the hearth and then fix the fuses to the bellows mechanism so that it would go up when the bellows was pulled.’

  Merriman looked thunder struck. ‘Yes, lad, I think you could. Are you thinking that you might make such grenades using the Furnace Vale Cartridges?’

  ‘I am,’ said Josiah.

  ‘To leave a hole as shallow as the one we’ve got, the charge would have to be off the ground.’

  ‘Mounted on the bellows mechanism itself?’ suggested Michael. ‘Possibly,’ said Merriman. ‘But we’d need the bellows mechanism to be sure and that must have been destroyed by the blast.’

  ‘But somewhere in the wreckage, there might be pieces of whatever contained the cartridges. We don’t know exactly what we’re looking for, but remnants might seem out of place in some way, and we know we’re looking for metal about an inch thick. We better search the debris before the light starts to go.’

  Starting from the front of the forge they moved out until they had a good idea of the maximum distance that debris had been thrown. Then they formed a short line with about two arms lengths between them. They went back and forward over the field of debris, turning towards the forge on each pass. But while they found plenty of tools, bits of coal and pieces of the roof, nothing seemed out of place and there was no sign of bits of thick metal.

  ‘Better check again inside,’ said Josiah. They looked round on both the floor and on what was left of the fittings. It was now rather dark in the forge and they had to light a couple of oil lamps.

  ‘Gentlemen, what is that up there?’ said Michael. He pointed to the highest of the roof members still in position. As he moved his lamp Josiah saw something reflect the light. Sticking out of the wood were some slivers of metal. By standing on the large anvil Josiah could reach the objects. They were so sharp he cut his finger as he eased one out of the wood.

  ‘What do you make of that?’ he said to Michael handing down the fragment.

  Michael turned it over in his hands. ‘It’s cast iron. Can you get me down some more pieces?’ He passed the piece to Merriman. ‘Do you cast iron here?’

  ‘Nay, we don’t do castin’ at all. If we need pieces castin’ we order them from a local foundry.’ He took the fragment from Michael. ‘It’s certainly iron and it looks as if it came from something curved.’

  Josiah passed down a second piece to them. ‘I think I can get at some more,’ he said. It took a bit more effort but he retrieved two other pieces. ‘There are a few more up there, but we’ll need a ladder to reach them.’

  They went out into the light to have a better look at the shards. Michael managed to fit all four pieces together. They formed part of what might once have been a tube with an internal diameter of about an inch, same as a blasting candle. They could see that the outer surface of the tube had been notched in places so that it was criss-crossed by knobbly square sections. Some of the pieces of iron had fractured down those grooves between the knobbles. But the complete section of the metal was about an inch thick.

  ‘If there is no casting done here, how did McBrinnie make his horseshoes?’ asked Josiah.

  ‘Never ’ad cause to think about that ’till now,’ said Merriman. ‘He ’ad a workshop near the ponies. Maybe he ‘ad a small furnace there?’

  ‘The inside surface of these pieces is blackened,’ said Michael.

  ‘What a vicious weapon. Small enough to carry, powerful enough to kill or maim several men, and controllable using the cartridge fuse material,’ said Josiah.

  They went back to the search. Some digging where the hearth had been yielded some more cast iron shards. Knowing what to look for helped them see pieces on the ground that they had not spotted before. Josiah’s thoroughness pushed him in the direction of doing something very macabre. He went back to McBrinnie’s body and examined the whole of it, finding more shards embedded deep in his arms and legs. In the end, after some extra help from a couple of Johnstone’s men, they collected enough pieces of metal to suggest there had been at least two tubes used. The cartridges must have been used. They retrieved an intact end cap also made of cast iron with a space just right for the fuse for a blasting candle.

  The last shift of men from below ground were going home. It was much too late to do any more that day. Merriman had things to attend to and Josiah wished to inform Mr Johnstone that this was indeed a murder but that the body could now be moved indoors.

  Johnstone took the news well. ‘I wish it was not so,’ he said, ‘but when I saw the explosion, even then it struck me very unlikely that someone as thorough as McBrinnie would have had an accident like that.’

  ‘We will be back tomorrow. We need to find where the tubes for the charges were cast.’

  ‘They wouldn’t have been made here,’ said Johnstone.

  ‘These were very ingenious devices. I think it very likely that Mr McBrinnie devised and made them himself. Even if they were not actually made here it’s the most likely place to find evidence of how they were made,’ said Josiah.

  31

  A Common Past

  Having informed Mr Johnstone of the murder Josiah asked the coachman to take Michael and him to Hailsworth Hall. When they arrived, while Michael waited in the kitchens, no doubt using the time to charm some delicacies out of the cook, Josiah was ushered through to the library where he was joined by Mr Hailsworth who interrupted his dinner to talk to him.

  ‘Is it as bad as it appeared?’ was his immediate question to Josiah.

  ‘Possibly worse, Sir. It is definitely murder in a particularly ingenious and vicious manner. McBrinnie was the clear target and only McBrinnie, though the murderer could not have known for certain that McBrinnie would be alone when the explosion was triggered.’

  ‘I am very surprised. McBrinnie was such a thorough man and irrespective of professional eccentricities, it seems unlikely he could have had such an enemy? How was the explosion arranged?’

  ‘The murderer used what were effectively grenades made specially to take your son’s patent blasting cartridges. I believe McBrinnie designed and constructed those devices but have to prove it.’

  ‘Did he make them on my land?’

  ‘I suspect somewhere within or nearby the mine. I intend to return tomorrow try to find where.’

  Mr Hailsworth frowned. ‘You will need to question my son Abram at some point, will you not?’

  ‘Yes Sir, but not yet. I would like to have a clearer idea of how the grenades were made. At present it remains as I said when we last spoke. I do not consider Abram a suspect but I do suspect he is much more deeply involved with this matter than appeared to be the case.’

  ‘Thank you, Constable. If there is anything I can do to aid your endeavours you need only ask.’

  ‘Thank you Sir.’

  Mr Hailsworth placed a fatherly hand on Josiah’s shoulder. ‘Josiah, I have every confidence in you.’

  Josiah felt a combination of pleasure and sadness. Mr Hailsworth was an upright and kindly man, whose praise he valued. But to see him so distressed about his son moved Josiah.

  ‘I will not fail you Sir.’

  The coachman had taken advantage of the stop at Hailsworth Hall to change to a fresh, single horse. The journey back to Long Clough was therefore more leisurely than the outward journey.

  ‘Tell me more about Elijah Bradshawe,’ said Michael as the brougham left the Hailsworth estate.

  ‘He came originally from Ireland but never told Rachael where from. When she first met him he was a drunk and taking opium from a woman called Aunty who ran what might loosely be called a house of disrepute. She exploited Rachael. Eventually, Elijah and Rachael came to the Furness Vale and after the previous owner of the farm died, Elijah founded the Children of Fire.’

  ‘Have you got any real idea who killed him?’

  ‘Not really. I know a lot about how he w
as killed but as to who, I have no clue. I suspected McBrinnie was implicated because the nails used were his design. Now he is dead, any connection of someone else to him seems to have been erased.’

  ‘So you’ve lost your main suspect and you don’t have enough information about what Elijah’s life was like in Ireland to pick up a new thread there.’

  ‘That’s about the size of it. All I have are bits and pieces, such as what looked like battle scars on his body when I examined it before the funeral. One was probably from a sabre stroke to his shoulder and another, near his hip, from a musket ball. Rachael knew about them but he would never tell her how he had them. It is a fair assumption that they were obtained in Ireland but that is as far I can get.’ Josiah pulled out his notebook from his pocket. ‘Everything I know is in here.’

  Michael took the notebook and started to thumb through it, occasionally holding it up to the window to make the most of the fading evening light. Then he stopped and stared intensely at a single page. He put the book down, took off his jacket and rolled up his sleeve. Then without a word, he presented his left forearm to Josiah. In the middle of Michael’s arm was a tattoo. It showed the familiar shape of a celtic harp. The difference between Michael’s tattoo and Elijah’s was that on Michael’s the words below the harp were clear enough to read even in poor light: It is new strung and shall be heard. Josiah looked up at Michael in astonishment.

  ‘Elijah and I seem to have had something in common. I think I might be able to fill in some of the story of what he was doing in Ireland when he got those wounds.’

  The coach pulled up; they had arrived at Long Clough. Josiah, his head spinning with surprise that Elijah and Michael should have anything in common, got down.

  He had wondered on the way back if he could slink in to sleep and make himself scarce from Long Clough the following morning rather than having to move out at the end of such a hard day. But as he looked up at the farmhouse he saw Rachael standing at the front door. She came towards them. Josiah groaned. She must still be enraged and would now demand he left immediately. He could not really blame her.