The Bride of Newgate

by John Dickson Carr

  “You may be sure I was there. The money lay on the desk. Might he trouble me for the formality of a receipt? Of course!” Mr. Raleigh hesitated. “But I am not perhaps,” he added superfluously, “a good man of business. What documents I signed, or the nature of them, remains a mystery to me.

  “I took my ten pounds, and forgot the matter.

  “That was the night of April 24th. Just a week later, the—the horror (forgive such a big-drum word for my small affairs) came on me. I received a letter from Mr. Caliban.

  “It reminded me of our agreement, evidently made a week ago. It seemed Mr. Caliban had loaned me twenty pounds on my note-of-hand: this sum was to be paid back, at one hundred per cent interest, in quarterly installments. The letter did not ask for payment, as yet; it merely reminded me.”

  Mr. Raleigh moistened his lips.

  “And again—how shall I explain?” he asked. “My first impulse, as usual, was to slink away and in some fashion make my peace with Lord Francis. This soon passed. Run to a magistrate? Cry for a help which would now be useless? You may call me bookish-minded and crazed. But this is what I thought.”

  Mr. Raleigh’s whole bearing changed.

  “I thought to myself: what would Shakespeare have said? Or Kit Marlowe? Or rare Ben Jonson? Or manly Wycherley? Or even those authors, of our own day, who have given us Marmion and Childe Harold: what would they have said? ‘Forbear, old hunks!’—would they have said?—‘slink gently and timorously away.’”

  Then again the deep drum roll thundered in his voice.

  “‘No, by God!’ they would have said. ‘Let the dog be run through with a sword!’ And so I determined to kill.”

  Mr. Raleigh lowered his bald head, all triumph gone. He was only a tired, aging man who for a brief time had opened his locked-up heart.

  “The rest,” he added, “is short and simply told.

  “I had learned so much of their affairs through one circumstance, viz: that you must not suppose Mr. Caliban new to this business. Their firm had been at work upwards of seven months, from a house near Hyde Park. This house here, if they changed, would be more daring with no rent to pay. When they discussed small changes in their plan of action, I knew the plan itself.

  “No one ever entered this house save Lord Francis and Mr. Fletcher, and then by the back door. There were no servants. The ‘servant’ who drove me on the first night had been Mr. Fletcher. The caretaker, paid by Lord Francis’s father, had been sent away. On the night they expected a client, the front door would be left unlocked for the coachman to open.

  “Lord Francis Orford would sit in this room, wearing a black mask and with false teeth removed to disguise his voice. The coach always arrived at midnight, when no one would see it or no drunken wanderer even pay heed to it.

  “I chose at random the night of May 5th. I carried with me two old rapiers in their long heavy-headed leather case. The front door was unlocked. As St. James’s Church clock struck the quarter-hour to twelve, I went in.

  “Lord Francis had not yet put on his mask or removed his false teeth. He was surprised to see me, but not alarmed.

  “For I was humble. I made apology, God forgive me. I said I had tried to be too sharp in asking payment for my work, and had been taught a deserved lesson. This pleased him; he thought it his just due.

  “But, I added, I had just procured a new fine employment at the Pantheon, at ten pounds a week; we should soon have done with money troubles. He wished to know my new work; he was curious about the case; I knew it would be so. I said I had newer, more amazing feats of sword-jugglery with oranges. I demurred from showing them until he grew angry, and ordered me . …

  “Have you wondered why there were two swords?

  “I had oranges in my pockets. But he bade me bring a handful from the bowl over there. One rapier I placed on the desk at my right hand. With my left hand—explaining how much more difficult this was; a lie—I used the other sword when I tossed up oranges and caught them.

  “Lord Francis was absorbed. His attention was fastened on my left hand. He paid no heed to my right. But with my right hand I caught up the other rapier. I lunged across that narrow desk. And I stabbed him through his poisoned heart.

  “This was when I heard, too soon, the very faint sound of muffled horseshoes as the coach returned.

  “Dick,” added Mr. Raleigh, dropping all formal address and speaking heavily, “only one more thing you must have noticed. Look there!”

  And Mr. Raleigh, lifting his candle, pointed toward the doorway of the red-and-gold-patterned room.

  “The fireplace! The chimney piece!” said Darwent.

  Well he remembered it, on the right side of the door as he entered. The stone fireplace, with its long tapering hood from which …

  “If you had stopped to think,” Mr. Raleigh said gently, “you would have known it for a dummy. What lunatic, at least in our age, builds a fireplace with its back to the wall of a main hall? Lord Francis’s masons built it, because the other fireplace had been cut off by the partitioned wall. One can climb up inside, stand on a ledge, and hear without being seen. Then, with the aid of a folding trap, the hidden person slips down into the main Hall behind.”

  “And you climbed up there? It was you who—” Darwent stopped.

  “I climbed up,” assented the other. “I took my leather case. But I left the two rapiers, to suggest a duel and no murder. I wanted one last bitter word with the coachman.”

  He glanced toward Jemmy, whose agreeable smile was edged with hatred.

  “I could see nothing,” said Mr. Raleigh. “Dick, how could I guess it was you? When the door clapped to, I imagined the coachman to be there with some poor devil. I gave the coachman my final taunt. Down the chimney I said …”

  “‘He must not reach the windows,’” repeated Darwent.

  “With Orford dead, I wrongly believed, their whole filthy lost room would explode like a powder magazine. Let a client touch one of the windows, and … well, that was my taunt. Afterwards I had only to slip out through the folding trap, and leave by the front door.

  “That is all I have to say. You have heard my confession; do as you like. I killed him. And, as God sees me, I would do it again.”

  A long silence, except for heavy breathing, held silent the dingy room.

  Except for the dim moonlight glow over the statue of Pan, looking on derisively, six candles—five held in hands, one on the desk with the bloodstained chair behind it—made a dull ring of light as though for a council circle.

  The silence was broken by Jemmy Fletcher, who looked down at Townsend.

  “And now, my dear Charlie,”—to call a runner a Charlie was the deadliest insult at Bow Street—“hadn’t you better unlock these darbies, and put them where they belong?”

  “’Ad I, now?” whispered Townsend, as though holding his breath.

  “Come, dear lad, what have I done?” crowed Jemmy. “Dick’s alive. Till Lewis, somebody says, is still alive. It was larks, Charlie; only my larks! I have friends, influential friends, who will show it.” Then Jemmy nodded toward Raleigh. “But him?” His voice went up to a scream. “They’ll hang him! They’ll hang him! They’ll hang him!”

  Darwent moved toward him with a soft, dangerous step.

  “Oh, no, they won’t,” said Darwent.

  Round that intent group went a faint sibilance of approval, as though of breath released, in a kind of hiss; and Caroline’s was the most approving of all.

  Darwent turned toward Mr. Raleigh. The candleholders they carried were close together, throwing weights of shadow underneath. Nobody saw the treasury notes Darwent slipped into his companion’s waistcoat pocket.

  “Go home, forget all this, and sleep,” he said gently. “You will not be arrested. You will not even be suspected.”

  Mr. Raleigh regarded him with a stupid, bewildered look. He could not meet anyone’s eye.

  “Dick, I …”

  “No,” said Darwent firmly. “You committed n
o murder. You trod on an insect. Sir, even before the matter of—of Dolly Spencer, I saw you were under some great strain as soon as I mentioned number thirty-eight St. James’s Square. Go in peace. When you have rested, we will speak of the matter of finding you employment.”

  The other’s mouth worked. “Dick, to thank you …”

  “No!”

  Hesitantly, Mr. Raleigh turned toward the door. He turned there, and spoke in an apologetic but sincere voice to them all.

  “Believe me, I should not mind ….” His hand went up to his throat, as though there were a rope there. “Except for one thing, again no doubt foolish. It would leave Emma alone. Good night.”

  He moved away, one thin light leaving the group, and they heard him go faltering down the hall. Darwent whirled round to Townsend and Jemmy.

  “Take off his handcuffs,” he said to Townsend.

  “’Ere! M’lord!”

  “Take off his handcuffs.”

  Jemmy assumed a half-sneer of virtue as the catch clicked.

  “Listen to me, Jemmy,” said Darwent. Again his hand shot out and gripped Jemmy’s cravat. “I desire to know whether you have understood anything, anything, of what has been said tonight. Do you believe in hell?”

  “How should I know? Ask the parson fellows!”

  “Let us suppose, for the sake of argument, there is a hell. Do you know why Frank Orford’s soul rots deep in it? Let me tell you. It was not because Frank cheated a poor devil like Raleigh. Not in the least. It was because Frank thought he had a right to cheat him. —Do you understand that, my soaring songbird?

  “No, I see you don’t,” Darwent added. “Mr. Mulberry?”

  “Aye?”

  “Speaking as a lawyer, how much evidence have we to hang this beauty?”

  Gathering up his white hat from a corner, Mr. Mulberry sat down in a dead man’s chair at the desk, glowering at the candle there.

  “Why, Dick,” he grunted, “if we had more evidence, you couldn’t use it; it’d be too much. For that affair at the opera, there’s half the Fancy to swear he hired ’em (inciting to riot: stretched neck). There’s five who’ve already sworn he stabbed Mr. Lewis (attempted murder: stretched neck).”

  “Have you anything to add, Mr. Townsend?”

  “Well, m’lord,” said Townsend, dropping the handcuffs into one pocket and then patting both, “me and you and ’er ladyship together, we could show in ten minutes ’ow he tried to shoot you in the back. At Newgate they don’t like people as shoots friends in the back. He’ll have things thrown at him afore Langley scrags him outside debtors’ door.”

  And Jemmy’s eyes began to turn one way, turn another way . …

  “Now go free,” said Darwent, dropping his hand from the cravat. “I release you because I must. But one little word from me, Jemmy. If you ever so much as breathe a hint of Raleigh’s guilt …”

  “I won’t, old boy! Word of a gentleman!”

  “Remember, I shall hear it. And the law works too slowly for me. I mean to call on you one night. When I leave, Jemmy, you will not be alive.”

  And now Jemmy’s knees gave way. These threats of the law, though frightening, seemed remote and scarcely touching his cosseted life. But Darwent was different. Darwent he understood perhaps less than the former understood him. In Jemmy’s eyes Darwent was inhuman, like one of those iron figures they exhibited: a monstrosity who never missed with the pistol, never missed with the sword, never failed to keep a promise of death. And something in Jemmy Fletcher cracked across, cracked with terror, and was never the same again.

  “Mum’s the word!” he babbled, and hurried for the door. But, at the door, he remembered his position as a dandy. Moistening two fingers at his mouth, he manipulated a few strands of his fair hair so they stood up like a flower.

  “Ill-breeding!” sneered Jemmy, and ran for the street door as though pursued, taking another light with him.

  “Mr. Townsend,” Darwent said gravely, “I am told you gentlemen of the runners have a certain admirable code. If evidence be necessary, produce it; if not … exactly! It being always understood that the honorarium shall not be so high as to be called by an unpleasant name.”

  “M’lord,” crowed Townsend, pleased by such a word as “honorarium.” “You couldn’t ha’ said it better, Lord Darwent, if you’d been Lord Malmesbury hisself!”

  “Thank you. If you will do me the honor to call on me next day …?”

  “I’ll do meself the honor,” returned Townsend. At the door, candle illuminating his red waistcoat, he gave his best evidence of sincerity.

  “I’d ha’ done it for nothing, damme!” he declared, “if times wasn’t so hard and my wife so devilish agg-a-ravating ever since she cotched me a-writing my amours. M’lady: m’lord: yours very truly: good night.”

  Another light moved away, adding to the gathering darkness. For some time Mr. Mulberry had been sitting behind the desk, thick arms folded, blinking rheumy and brandy-filled eyes at the candlewick.

  “Ayagh!” he growled. “And I daresay I’m next?”

  “Bert! Listen, and stop your posturing. Yes, posturing: stop it!” Darwent paused for a moment. “What I owe you,” he said, “I can never repay. There’s not another man in London with the brain to solve that mystery.”

  “Ayagh!” growled Mr. Mulberry, trying to look as though he scoffed at this.

  “I won’t insult your present mood by offering you payment; though you deserve it and you shall have it whether it suits you or not.”

  “To buy my silence about tallow-faced Fletcher, who ought to hang higher than Haman?”

  “No. To protect an old friendless man, who would be dealt with as the law dealt with me. —You will be silent, Bert, for two reasons. First, because you are my friend; and, second, because you know that this is just.”

  Now, for a time, Mr. Mulberry blinked at the tip of the candle flame. Presently, grunting as he rose, he took his hat in one hand and the brass candle dish in the other.

  “Ay, lad,” he said as he passed Darwent, “I’ll stand by ye. You know that.”

  But, at the door, he turned round, shifting the battered hat in his fingers.

  “My lady,” he said, with that maudlin fondness for Caroline, “I have at the moment a great thirst for cold rum punch. This, perhaps regrettably, I propose to satisfy. But, by God,” said Mr. Mulberry, rapping his knuckles against the side of his head, “I have reason to be proud of this old noggin!”

  And, hat on the side of his head, he marched down the hall.

  Caroline had been expecting, had been waiting for, what would happen then. For some time she had known only one emotion. It was not pity for Mr. and Mrs. Raleigh; she had felt that, but it was gone. All her feelings had concentrated into a blind, mad hatred of Darwent.

  Caroline did not know why she felt this. She never stopped to think. She did not reflect that—with all questions answered, with the great wheels stopped—there must flow back more strongly than ever what had been strongest from the first: what had been only turned aside, momentarily deflected, by the clash of blades or the wildness of emotions.

  That night … how she had loved him! When she heard the news of his supposed death, she had known an agony as close to real heart-break as mankind can feel. She had not shown it: no! In this modern year 1815, one must only creep into a corner and weep until the eyes are blind.

  And then—he was alive. And that creature was dying. Dick had believed that she, Caroline, would stoop to ensure that creature’s death. When he questioned her, his disbelief was like a slap across the face.

  Even this she would not have minded, or at least could have endured, if he had not shown he had loved the creature … all the time. He loved the creature. There was the burn of hatred, the crux of misery, the last bitterness!

  These would have been Caroline’s thoughts, if she had even tried to put them together, as Mr. Mulberry marched away down the hall. Only two candles now burned in the dim room.

  To
hide the expression of her face, Caroline blew out her own light and put it down. She moved across to the desk and stood with her back to it. Some distance behind her was the moonlit window, and the statue of Pan.

  When Caroline spoke, she hoped her voice would not tremble. It did not. It was deadly cold and full of acid.

  “Then I am honored, sir, by being reserved as last?”

  He did not reply, lifting his candleholder as though to study her.

  “And in what manner, sir, can you procure my silence?”

  Still, maddeningly, he gave no reply. Caroline spoke as though wonderingly, from the depths of her being.

  “God, how I hate you!” she said.

  Darwent inclined his head. His voice, though perfectly level, was colder and more acid-stung than hers.

  “Then you make my task easier, madam.”

  “True, perhaps. You wish always for easy tasks. You have no courage; you never had. Then shall I tell you the threat you mean to use in compelling my silence?”

  “There is no threat, madam.”

  “Come, come! How clumsily we lie! You would threaten me with annulment of our marriage, so that I should be shamed and humiliated and mortified by having to tell why I married you. I much fear, my lord, you can never fight fairly. It gives you no satisfaction if you cannot stab in the back.”

  (Even as she heard herself crying out these words, Caroline was amazed and somewhat appalled. She did not mean them. She had not meant to say them. But she must strike, wound, hurt with any weapon.)

  “Two days ago,” she said, “that threat might have had force. But not now, my lord. Not now! Rather than humble myself before you in any way, I would give up two fortunes and be arrested for a common slut in Charlotte Street! Pray try your threat; it won’t work.”

  Darwent looked at her steadily.

  “I had thought of such a threat, I confess. But have no fear. I can’t do it.”

  “Oh, and he can’t do it! And why not?”

  “Because I love you,” Darwent answered quietly. Whereupon his own temper burst, and he yelled at her. “Now have done, you bawling fishwife, until I say the last word I mean to say to you.”