The English Monster

by Lloyd Shepherd

  “So, the Nincompoops have rediscovered their level of competence,” Harriott mutters to himself.

  “Which Nincompoops would those be?” asks Graham as he walks into the room. His voice is cheerful but he looks tired and rather anxious. Even his clothes seem dreary this evening.

  “Our colleagues in Shadwell,” replies Harriott. “I was just reading the Law Report.”

  “Ah, indeed. Our colleagues in Shadwell.” There is an edge to his voice as he shows Harriott into the dining room, but there is also a welcoming hand on the older man’s shoulder. “I am much exercised, these days, by our colleagues in Shadwell.”

  The dinner is all set, and the two men make some idle small talk while glasses are filled and dishes served. Then, with servants still hovering around and in between mouthfuls from Graham’s excellent kitchen, their conversation returns to the familiar subject around which their lives have revolved for almost two months now.

  “You must understand, my dear Harriott,” says Graham, “that I cannot hold Ablass for much longer. It has been almost a fortnight. I understand the length of his captivity is being raised in the Commons by the formidably irritating Burdett, who still seems rather more exercised by the rights of criminals than by the rights of those they prey upon.” Harriott, like Graham a staunch Tory, growls in agreement. “Really, Harriott, it has come to the ridiculous point of my being defended by the Prime Minister and the Home Secretary in the Commons chamber. This cannot go on.”

  “But Horton is still looking. He believes he is close to confirming how Ablass was involved.”

  “He may be close to confirming something, Harriott. But if it does not come in the next week, I’m afraid Ablass will be released by default, since it may be decided my head is somewhat more disposable than that of the head of the government.”

  “Graham, you have seen the man. We have both seen him, in captivity and in the streets of Wapping. We know him to be quite capable of these acts. Indeed, I have met no creature more fitting the requirements of such deeds.”

  “Indeed so, Harriott, indeed so. The man is monstrous. As cold as a sheet of Arctic ice and as calculating as a Whig on his uppers. But all I have so far is Mrs. Vermilloe’s testimony that Ablass knew Williams, and his refusal to account for himself for a short period on the night in question. The formidable Mrs. Vermilloe is no more reliable a witness than an inebriated fishwife—her stories shift and change more often than the items in my wardrobe. And, as Burdett is no doubt arguing in the House at this precise instant, Ablass is perfectly entitled not to say anything which may incriminate him. I need evidence, Harriott.”

  “And I believe Horton will provide it.”

  “And I believe you are right. But we are now under the fearsome microscope of the legislators. And it is an uncomfortable place to be, Harriott. Terrible uncomfortable.”

  Graham falls silent, and Harriott sees again just how worn-out his friend is. He remembers how he himself felt standing on the shore at Sheerness—that terrible sense of torpor, overwhelming in its deadening grasp. He remembers what Graham said to drag him out of it, and begins to ferret around in his own thoughts for some similarly inspiring words in return. Graham’s manservant appears with a message on a silver platter.

  “Ah, what fresh Hell is this!” exclaims Graham, archly. He reads the note, and what color there had been in his face (somewhat reclaimed by the excellent wine they have been drinking) falls away.

  “What is it, Graham? You look like you have seen a ghost.”

  “No indeed, Harriott. No indeed. But someone else may have done. This is a note requiring my immediate presence in Soho Square for a meeting with the PRS for an urgent discussion of the circumstances surrounding my arrest of a certain William Ablass.”

  “The PRS?”

  “The President of the Royal Society.”

  At about the same time on the same evening, Charles Horton is standing before a neat, dark little house, into which the neat, dark little figure he has been following for the previous couple of hours has disappeared. The house is to the north of Limehouse, near the Cut, and is tucked away on its own in between a small manufactory and a tannery. Horton has never noticed this place before; indeed, this entire street is new to him, as if it had been inserted into the topography while he’d been looking elsewhere.

  He has been walking for several hours in the afternoon crowds, monitoring the neat figure as it zigzagged its way through the streets. The figure was holding an ancient-looking leather bag from which emerged a variety of documents and papers, which were delivered to various addresses in Wapping, Shadwell, and up toward Whitechapel. All the while the neat figure kept itself to itself, seeming to disappear into the colors of the crowds. Horton had some difficulty keeping his eyes on this person, who was possessed of the most marked ability to lose himself that the officer had ever seen. Horton barely realizes that this is a quality he himself shares with the man he is following. The two of them dart in and out of the East End crowds, barely perceived, like ghostly whippets.

  As they’d approached this final little dark house, the figure’s zigzagging had become less pronounced and its urgent pace slowed. Which suggested that this was the neat figure’s ultimate destination; was perhaps its home.

  An address, thinks Horton. Finally, an address.

  He considers going home and coming back tomorrow. Abigail deserves some of his company. He has been rarely enough at home these past weeks, as his unofficial investigations into the Marr and Williamson murders have intensified and dragged him hither and thither across the districts of Wapping, Shadwell, Limehouse, and Ratcliffe. But the man is there; the man he has been seeking since New Year. The opportunity cannot possibly be passed up, can it?

  So Horton walks up to the door of the trim house, and bangs firmly on the door with its heavy cast-iron knocker. There is a pause (perhaps a disbelieving pause, as if whoever is inside does not receive many visitors) and then the door is opened to reveal the face of the neat figure whom Horton has been following all afternoon.

  “Benjamin Naar?” asks Horton, and reluctantly the man nods his head. “My name is Horton. I wish to ask you some questions about a ship currently at anchor in the dock at Sheerness. A ship called the Zong.”

  There is a pause. A shout comes from the shoe manufactory next door, and from somewhere comes the crash of metal against metal, as if something industrial had been dropped from a great height. The man standing at the door is wearing a plain frock coat and trousers, he is sporting a tidy beard and his dark hair is long and thick. His eyes are like coals. There is a deep stillness about him, in stark contrast with his busy zigzags of the preceding hours. He watches Horton carefully, as if acquiring data toward some critical decision. His appraising look makes Horton feel uncomfortable, making him (for once) an object of investigation. And then the man seems to make a decision.

  “No,” he says. “Not now. Come back tomorrow.”

  And he closes the door in Horton’s face.

  John Harriott, quietly seething, waits in the coach as it stands in Soho Square, covered by a thick blanket brought from Graham’s house for the purpose.

  He’d insisted on accompanying his friend on the short trip to Soho Square, to the residence of the President of the Royal Society. Graham was silent during the ten-minute journey, peering gloomily out at the dark streets as the carriage made its way west from Covent Garden. He’d brought his cigar along with him, and its smoke filled the interior of the coach. Harriott found himself picturing that ghastly old vessel at anchor in Sheerness, its dark interior creaking with memories.

  The coach came to a halt in front of an extremely well-appointed residence. Lights blazed out from the house, as if a party had recently come to an end. It looked the kind of house where parties were always starting and ending. Graham stepped out and Harriott prepared to follow him, but his friend barred the door and spoke firmly to the old magistrate.

  “You will wait here, John,” he said. “I cannot take y
ou in. He asked to speak to me, and to no one else.”

  “But, Graham, I must insist . . .”

  “No, John. I must insist. This is for my ears and my ears only. I welcome your company. But you can go no further. If I am to be a long time, I will send word and my coach here will take you back to your apartments.”

  And with that the door to the coach slammed shut, and Harriott settled down to being angry, cold and old. Really, this was extraordinarily bad form on Graham’s part. The two of them had been leading players in the murderous events on the Ratcliffe Highway for months, and now this intervention from an unexpected source, which promised to reveal much of interest, not least the nature of the Royal Society’s interest in the itinerant William Ablass. But Graham had shut this off to him. His frustration was immense—first the Shadwell magistrates had stood between him and a resolution, then the Home Secretary, and now even his friend. Self-pity flowed through him: an old man, abandoned and ignored on the edge of events.

  There was twenty minutes of this boiling resentment to sit through, and Harriott begins to think that Graham will send word, any moment, that he must go home. But then his friend appears at the door of the glamorous residence, beckoning to the coach driver. The driver climbs down and walks up the steps to the door of Banks’s house, and Graham instructs him to pick something up and carry it to the coach: a small barrel, the heaviness of which is apparent as the driver winces to heft it up on the roof of the coach. A coil of something white sits on top of it.

  Graham steps into the coach, and with a “Hai!” the driver gets them moving again. For a while, Graham says nothing at all, and his face is invisible in the shadows. Harriott feels unable to speak.

  “Do you like modern poetry, Harriott?” Graham asks, suddenly. His old friend starts.

  “Graham, the question is . . .”

  “Some of it is rather good,” Graham continues, his voice soft and quiet and steady. “I am particularly keen on Coleridge, who is a good friend of the PRS, I understand. Indeed, when I think of what I have just been told, I do wonder whether Coleridge knows rather more of the world than I have ever given him credit for.”

  Harriott says nothing, feeling at once exasperated and helpless.

  Graham speaks again.

  “I must ask Horton to do something for us. And I must tell you of what Banks just told me. But not tonight. Not in the dark.”

  Silence, then. Nothing apart from the echoing clip of the horses’ hooves on the cobblestones below, the occasional slash of the whip, and the thousand little shrieks and calls of the vast, near sleeping metropolis. Harriott finds himself looking at the ceiling of the coach’s cab and wondering what is in that little barrel. Graham whispers to himself:

  “From his brimstone bed at break of day

  A walking the Devil is gone

  To visit his snug little farm the Earth,

  And see how his stock goes on.”

  1 FEBRUARY 1812

  Horton appears at the door of the same trim little house the next day, at the same time. It had been difficult walking away from this door the previous day, when the Jew had closed it in his face, but there had been something about the man’s calm, appraising stare that had suggested a stubborn resolution. Besides, he had no authority to insist on entry. Indeed, he had no jurisdiction at all. This continued to be a secretive investigation. What was he to do, break down the man’s door?

  In any case, the behavior of Naar had excited him, because it had indicated that he might have something to tell. The face of the man, the realization and acceptance behind the eyes—Horton had seen these things before, and they always betokened at best knowledge, at worst guilt. The initials BN had featured heavily in the pages Horton had torn from Marr’s ledger book, which had meticulously recorded every order Marr had taken since he’d opened his shop. Horton had investigated the majority of the orders in that book, and had spoken to dozens of intermediaries, agents, factors, and middlemen throughout Wapping and Shadwell in an attempt to make a connection between the Zong and the tradesmen of the docks, but Naar had remained elusive throughout the early days of 1812. For weeks he was only “BN.” It took the information of a Norwich trader Horton had met in a Shadwell tavern (following up a suggestion from a cooper in Limehouse) to confirm the man’s name.

  And so now, after weeks of trudging the streets and checking names against lists, he finds himself here at this door. He has been in a state of nervous excitement all day, barely able to contain himself. An answer to the riddle of “Henry Morgan” might lie just beyond this solid, well-maintained sheet of wood.

  But when he knocks at the door there is no answer, and something about the stillness of the house disturbs him. As Margaret Jewell had tried (and failed) to do weeks before, he suppresses a little sliver of panic as he knocks again. Still nothing. Even the tannery and the shoe factory are quiet. It is as if the residents of this district have all crouched down behind something in order to hide from this visitor from Wapping.

  He knocks a third time, and when there is again no response he loses patience and tries the handle of the door. Jurisdiction be damned. With a small creak and a squeak, the door opens and he can step inside. The remnants of the late January afternoon light pick out the shape of a staircase, doors leading off to the right and left, and at the end of a short hallway a door through to a kitchen at the back.

  At the foot of the stairs is a new candle, and a clean, dry-looking tinderbox with which to light it. It has been placed there very deliberately. Next to it is a note. Horton picks this up. It reads: You will find me in the study upstairs.

  Horton uses the tinderbox and its new charcloth to light the candle, and climbs the stairs. At the top there are three doors, one of which is half open. He goes in, and to his surprise finds an opulently appointed bedroom, hung with shimmering threads and carpeted with a deep, rich pile. A four-poster bed resembles some Arabian trader’s tent pitched in a Maghreb oasis. Horton half-expects to see the beautiful dark faces of Turkish concubines emerging from the purple-and-yellow drapes.

  But this is no study, so he steps out of the beautiful bedroom and tries one of the other two doors. Inside the first, he finds Naar.

  The Jewish financier is face down on a desk, his hands hanging loosely at his sides, dressed in the same smart frock coat as the previous evening. The desk is bare apart from an envelope displaying Horton’s name, and a fine crystal glass. Horton picks up the glass and sniffs at it. There is a strong smell of bitter almonds. He puts his hand on the back of Naar’s neck. It is cold.

  Finally, Horton picks up the envelope, opens it, and takes out the letter within. He sits down to read it in the room’s single leather armchair, in front of its fireplace.

  Mr. Horton

  My Apologies.

  If the discovery of my Body comes as a grievous Surprise to you, or as something in another way upsetting, I am sorry.

  How you found me I do not know, although I assume you have Papers from either Mr. Marr or Mr. Williamson which mention my Dealings with them. My dead Body and my ready Willingness to mention those poor men in this Note clearly implicate me in their atrocious Despatches.

  Nevertheless, my Faith does not place as much weight on Redemption as does yours. Even if I were forced to make my Case to the Lord, I do believe I would have one to make.

  This note is not a confessional Document. Once again I must apologise if that comes as a Disappointment to you. I shall not be naming Names.

  I will just say this—I am not the Killer. I did not kill those Unfortunates. I know who did, and I know what was upon him when he took their lives. He is someone I know well, indeed. My Family has talked of him much over the decades.

  I shall offer neither Explanation nor Expiation. My relationship with the Killer—or rather, my Family’s relationship—is both long and complicated.

  My willingness to help the Individual you seek in his Undertakings is explained by my desperation to protect the surviving elements of my extended
Family. That Family is distributed across the Globe, as is sadly often the case with my People. The Individual knows where much of that family is situated, and has threatened on multiple occasions to wreak a terrible Revenge upon them if I did not support him in his efforts.

  Also, my Family does owe this Individual a debt of Gratitude, which will sound unusual to you but cannot be explained without further information relating to the Individual concerned, information which I am not prepared to divulge to anyone.

  Thus, I sent you away yesterday to prepare for today: to prepare my Death, and to remove traces of my dealings. My Money has been moved to somewhere it can be useful. I leave this world confident that I have, at all times, acted with good Intentions and with only the Resources that God has given me. If He has decided that this is how it must be, I can do no more than make the best of it.

  Once again, my Apologies. And please, if you know more than I think you do, if you are closer to the Killer than I can imagine you are, do take Care.

  Best regards

  Benjamin Naar

  Horton folds up the note and puts it in a pocket. He stands up and looks into the fireplace. It is full to the brim of fine ash, a few black curls of paper mixed in.