Best British Crime 6 - [Anthology]

by Edited by Maxim Jakubowski

  “Sir, he didn’t see my face, I swear it. And I was away through the crowd before he knew the watch was gone.”

  “Give it me,” he commanded.

  Mr. Fanmole held out his hand and she dropped the watch onto his palm. To her surprise he smiled. “Ah! He will be enraged. He’s deeply attached to his Breguet timepiece.”

  “Sir,” she asked timidly, “how much will I have when you sell it? My mother—”

  “It’s too precious to sell, child. Far too precious.”

  “But, sir, I don’t understand.”

  He gazed at her, whistling tunelessly, and put down the watch, very gently, on the table. “You don’t have to understand.”

  “I—I thought you’d be pleased, sir.”

  Suddenly he was on his feet and looming over her. His hand shot out and seized her by the hair. He dragged her to a tall cupboard built into the wall on the right of the fireplace. He opened the door. Hanging inside was a yellow silk gown.

  “This is how to please me, child.”

  * * * *

  3: Not Quite the Gentleman

  In the opinion of Sir John Ruispidge, Mr. Brunel was not quite the gentleman. But it would be churlish to deny that he had been kindness itself after the distressing theft of the Breguet watch at Temple Meads Station. He had summoned police officers and urged them to prosecute their enquiries with the utmost vigour. He had ordered advertisements to be placed in the Bristol papers, offering a reward of twenty guineas for the watch’s safe return.

  “Not for the world, my dear sir,” he had said, “would I have had such an incident occur.”

  Sir John could well believe it. The long and the short of it was that Brunel had every reason to keep him sweet.

  That evening he dined in Queen Square with two men who might become fellow directors if he decided to accept Brunel’s overtures. Still shaken by his experience, he drank deep and left early. The loss of his watch had been a double blow—first the watch itself, which he cherished, and second the circumstances of its theft. As an old soldier, Sir John prided himself on being a man of action, always prepared for the unexpected. But he had not even tried to apprehend the young person. He had behaved, in short, like a milksop.

  But he would not be caught unprepared again. As the carriage whirled him back to his hotel near the Cathedral, Sir John patted the pocket of his overcoat and felt the reassuring outline of his Adams revolver. Only recently patented, it was a double-action model enabling rapid fire; according to his gunsmith, its bullet would stop a charging tiger.

  The carriage drew up outside the hotel. A servant let down the steps and opened the door. As he climbed down, Sir John stumbled, and would have fallen if the man had not steadied him. He was perhaps a trifle bosky, but he prided himself on being a man who could hold his liquor. There might even be a case for a little brandy to aid digestion before he retired.

  His apartments were on the first floor. He opened the sitting-room door and discovered that the people of the house had forgotten to bring lights and make up the fire. He marched towards the fireplace, intending to ring for a servant.

  But something stopped him in his tracks, something amiss. There was a perfume in the air, clearly identifiable despite the underlying smell of his cigars. He acted without conscious thought. He pulled the heavy revolver from his pocket. Simultaneously he glimpsed a shadow shifting on the far side of the room.

  The revolver went off with a crash that stunned him, the echoes almost masking the sound of scuffling and a cry and the closing of the door to the bedroom next to the sitting room. He was so surprised he nearly dropped the gun. He had not intended to shoot; he had forgotten that the Adams revolver was self-cocking and lacked a safety catch.

  “Stop, thief!” Sir John cried, and the words came out little better than a whimper.

  He moved unsteadily to the connecting door and flung it open. The bedroom appeared to be empty. A second door, leading directly to the corridor, stood open; the corridor was empty, too.

  Trembling, Sir John returned to the bedroom and tugged the bell rope so hard it came away in his hand. As he looked about him for the brandy decanter, a piece of material on the carpet caught his eye. He picked it up and examined it under the light.

  It was a scrap of yellow silk.

  * * * *

  During the following day, Robbie earned a few coppers helping a stall holder at the market. Everyone was talking about the burglar at the Great Western Hotel, and how an old gent had put a bullet in him. When Robbie got back to his lodgings, the cobbler called out to him from his workshop.

  “There’s a woman asking after you. That nurse, Mrs. Allardyce. She said you was to go over to Mrs. Linnet’s. But first things first. I need a dozen tallow candles from Hornby’s. If you look sharp you’ll catch them before they close.”

  Robbie ignored the order, just as he ignored the shout that pursued him up the street. He ran all the way to Hotwells. The house where the Linnets lodged was full of lights and noise but their window was dark. He climbed the stairs and tapped on the door. There was no answer. He turned the handle and went inside the room. The air made him gag.

  “Mrs. Linnet? Mary?”

  “Robbie?” Mary’s mother whispered from the alcove near the fireplace. “Is that you?”

  “Yes. Shall I light the lamp?”

  He blundered through the darkness and found the oil lamp and a box of matches on the mantel. Mrs. Linnet’s face appeared in the wavering light. She was lying on her pallet, huddled under a mound of blankets.

  “What’s happened? Where’s Mary?”

  “She didn’t come back last night. Mrs. Allardyce stayed till morning but then she had to go.”

  “Is she coming to sit with you tonight?”

  The head rolled on the pillow. “No. I can’t pay her. Mary said she’d bring some money. Where is she, Robbie? I’m worried.”

  “I’ll find her. Did she go out again last night?”

  “Again? What do you mean? She went out once, and she never came back.”

  * * * *

  Mary Linnet was on fire. Her lips were chapped and she felt as though her skin was flaking away. Her tongue lay huge and dry in her mouth. She was aware of the pain in her left shoulder. There was moisture, too, dark and thick and tasting of iron.

  She did not know how long she had lain in this dark place, drifting in and out of consciousness. Once, in the glow of a candle, the Reverend Mr. Fanmole loomed over her like a great grey slug in a dressing gown. She remembered Mr. Fanmole waiting for her with a closed carriage when she had stumbled through the side door of the hotel. She remembered his hot breath on her cheek, and how he had made her lie on the carriage floor as they jolted up the hill to Clifton.

  “Don’t sit on the seat, you stupid child, you’ll bleed on the leather.”

  Now Mary was lying on a thin layer of straw spread over a flagged floor with a mound of logs in the corner. A barred window was set high in a wall. Sometimes there was natural light on the other side of it—not much, but enough to see the outlines of her prison.

  But perhaps that was a hallucination, too. She could no longer distinguish between what was inside her mind and what was without. Once she saw the Breguet watch swinging like a pendulum before her eyes, measuring away her life.

  Another time she saw as clear as day Robbie’s face framed by the little window. He tapped on the glass with fingers that were pale as bones, and she opened her mouth to call him, but she could no more speak than she could move.

  * * * *

  4: A Tribe of One

  On the second evening of his visit, Sir John Ruispidge dined at the Great Western Hotel. After his adventure the previous evening, he was pleased to discover that he was regarded as something of a hero. The story had already reached the newspapers—how a distinguished visitor to Bristol had surprised a burglar in his room and coolly put a bullet through the scoundrel. The villain had not yet been apprehended, but traces of blood had been found.


  Returning to his rooms after dinner, Sir John passed through the lobby of the hotel. A young man was engaged in an altercation with two of the hotel servants.

  “I’m not going,” the man was saying in a strong Bristol accent. “Not till I’ve seen him.”

  “You’ll be pitched out on your ear. I’ll summon a constable.”

  To judge by his clothes, the young man belonged to the labouring class, but he looked clean and respectable. He had a pleasant, manly face, Sir John considered, and he appeared sober. To the baronet’s surprise, the fellow pointed at him.

  “Why, there he is! Sir John, sir, let me speak to you.”

  “What is it, my man? Who are you?”

  The man pulled off his cap. “Robbie Trevine, sir, at your service. It’s—it’s about your watch. And what happened last night.”

  Sir John frowned. “The burglar? What had he to do with my watch? It was stolen hours earlier.”

  “I know, sir. If you’d let me explain?”

  “Come over here.”

  Sir John led the way to a sofa near the fire. He sat down and the man stood cap in hand before him. The servants hovered but kept their distance.

  “The watch was stolen by a young woman I know,” Trevine said.

  Sir John’s eyebrows rose. It had not been given out that the thief was a woman. “Go on.”

  “She’s not a thief, sir, I swear it, not by nature. Her mother’s ill, and she can’t pay for the doctor.”

  Sir John waved a hand. “Right is right, Trevine, and wrong is wrong. Nothing can alter that.”

  Trevine’s lips tightened. “Yes, sir.”

  “Do you know where she is now?”

  Trevine nodded.

  “Then I’m obliged to you. If this results in an arrest and the recovery of my watch, I shall see that you receive the reward. Tell me where to find her and leave your direction with—”

  “I don’t want your reward.”

  “What?”

  Trevine lowered his voice. “She’s wounded, sir. I saw her through a window not an hour ago, lying in a yellow dress like a streetwalker’s. There’s blood on her, all over the place. Maybe someone shot her.”

  “Stuff and nonsense.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Sir John glanced at the servants, making sure they were still out of earshot. He remembered the scrap of yellow silk he had found on his bedroom floor. “And—and where precisely is she?”

  “If I tell you, you’ll help her, sir?”

  “I make no promises.” Sir John wished he had not described his burglar to the authorities as “a hulking great brute.” “But I’m not a vengeful man. If this young woman can procure the return of my watch, I shall be content to let sleeping dogs lie. But first things first. Where is she?”

  “In Clifton, sir—up near the Downs where they’re building the new bridge. Rodney Place.”

  “What number?”

  “I don’t know, sir. But it’s where the Missionary Society is. Mr. Fanmole’s house.”

  Sir John slumped back in his chair as though flicked by an invisible finger. The air rushed from his lungs. “Fanmole?”

  Trevine looked at him in astonishment. “Yes, sir. A reverend gentleman.”

  “Little fellow with a fat neck? Slimy voice and a laugh like a hacksaw?”

  “That’s him to the life, sir.”

  Sir John stood up. “Damme, I see it all now.” He waved to the nearest servant. “You there! Whistle up a hackney carriage.” He turned back to Robbie Trevine. “Wait—I must fetch something. Then we’ll see what Mr. Fanmole has to say.”

  When he came back to the lobby, he was wearing a hat and a big overcoat and swinging what looked like a weighted walking stick. He swept Robbie into the hackney carriage at the hotel door and they rattled up the hill to Clifton. Sir John talked as they drove—he would have talked to anyone; he was as full of pressure as a GWR Northern Star locomotive.

  “That damned rogue Fanmole! My brother gave him one of our livings just before he died. But it didn’t take long for the rumours to start. Tittle-tattle about the village girls. Then the mother of one of my tenants died, turned out she’d just altered her will in Fanmole’s favour. Next thing I knew, he’d invested some money on behalf of his curate, and the money was lost; and the poor fellow blew out his brains; and guess who owned the company? Fanmole’s aunt, or some such. I could have taken him to court, but the scandal would have looked bad. So I made him resign the living, and I had a quiet word with the bishop, too.”

  “Mary says it’s his aunt’s house in Rodney Place,” Robbie said.

  “And what does the aunt say about her precious nephew, eh?”

  “If she does any talking, sir, no one’s taking much notice. She’s in a private asylum in Totterdown. But he runs his Missionary Society from her house.”

  “For the benefit of the heathen, eh? A tribe of one, I’ll be bound, and its name is Fanmole. Any servants?”

  “None that live in, I believe.”

  The hackney carriage drew up in Rodney Place. Sir John told the driver to wait, stormed up the steps, and hammered on the door. A moment later, bolts scraped from their sockets, and the door opened.

  Fanmole blinked up at them. “Why such unseemly noise, my dear sir? In any case, the Society is closed until the morning.”

  Sir John thrust his stick into the doorway. “You blackguard.”

  He shouldered his way into the house with Robbie at his heels. Fanmole gave ground before them, retreating up the dimly lit hallway.

  “Where’s my watch? Where’s that unfortunate girl?”

  “The girl you shot, Sir John?” Fanmole said. “Who now lies at death’s door? She came to me for help, and I gave her shelter. She is a common prostitute by the look of her, but no doubt that was part of her charm for you. I wonder what Lady Ruispidge will say when she hears that you consort with common sluts and then murder them.”

  * * * *

  5: Nothing Begets Nothing

  In the hall of the house in Rodney Place, Robbie said quietly, “You lie. Mary’s no slut.”

  Fanmole’s eyes flicked towards him and then returned to Sir John. “I assure you, sir, the girl is a prostitute, and a thief besides. I found a watch in her pocket when I was tending her, and I cannot believe she came by it honestly. I have prayed for her. Joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons, which need no repentance. Luke, chapter fifteen.”

  “If she’s a thief,” Robbie said, “it is because you made her steal.”

  “Take us to her,” Sir John demanded. “Let the girl put her side of the matter.”

  “You are not master here,” Fanmole said with his harsh laugh.

  Sir John pulled a revolver from his pocket. “I’ve not come here to argue with you.”

  Fanmole shrugged. He picked up a candlestick from the hall table and led the way through a green baize door. With their shadows dancing beside them on the whitewashed wall, they descended a flight of stairs and reached a passage running from front to back of the house.

  “She’s in a wood store,” Robbie said. “Lying on the floor without even a blanket.”

  “She was feverish,” Fanmole said over his shoulder. “She could not abide to be covered. The wood store was convenient since it is near the office where I conduct the business of the Missionary Society. Ah—here we are.”

  At that moment the candle went out, and total darkness enveloped them. There was the sound of a blow. Sir John cried out. Hobnails scraped on stone. Something clattered to the floor. Robbie blundered into a wall.

  A match scraped; a flame flared. Mr. Fanmole had the pistol in his hand. Keeping his eyes on Robbie, he lit the candle, which was now standing on a narrow shelf near a door at the back of the house. Sir John lay motionless on the floor, and there were streaks of blood in his silver hair.

  “You’ve killed him.”

  “I doubt it,” Fanmole said. “I hit him with the candlestick
but I used no more than reasonable force. You are my witness. He threatened me in my own house with a stick and a pistol. But let us be charitable. Age has infirmities of the mind as well as those of the body.” The barrel of the gun swung from Sir John to Robbie himself. “And what would a court make of your role in this, young man? Much depends on how you act now. Our first step must be to restrain this poor gentleman before he does any more damage. Open the back door. You will find the wood store beyond. He might as well cool his heels in there, along with his young woman. And you shall keep him company.”