The Chelsea Strangler

by Susanna GREGORY

  ‘He has outmanoeuvred us,’ Sutcliffe told his companions in grudging disbelief. ‘Who would have thought it of such a stupid fellow?’

  Chaloner glanced at Reymes. The prefect was blinking his shock, astonished to learn that Warwick had done something clever.

  ‘Then we shall ride after him,’ determined Lisle. ‘We risked a great deal by gathering here, and I am not leaving empty-handed. The time is perfect for rebellion, with the King driven out of London by the plague.’

  A couple of his cronies clamoured their agreement, but most shook their heads. The one Reymes had identified as Will Say was the first to make his objections heard.

  ‘This was an ill-conceived venture from the start, and I was a fool to think it might work. What use will a disease-ravaged city be to us? How will we raise an army when people are too frightened to look at strangers, let alone fight next to them? I say we take the boxes of shillings, and quit this benighted country while we can.’

  ‘He is right,’ said the man named Broughton. ‘And we should not forget the storm…’

  ‘What about it?’ asked Lisle belligerently.

  Broughton pointed upwards as lightning flashed. ‘It is a sign from God, warning us against throwing away our lives when the odds are stacked so heavily against us. There will be other opportunities, and I would rather wait until the auspices are more favourable.’

  His remarks prompted the radicals to go into a huddle, discussing their options in tense, agitated whispers. Sutcliffe did not join them. He limped to a nearby trough, where he sat and inspected his wounded leg. Reymes took a firmer grip on his sword and stepped towards him, murder in his eyes, but Sutcliffe showed him the dagger he held – and would throw if the prefect went any closer. Reymes faltered.

  ‘Cocke told me not to underestimate Warwick.’ Sutcliffe sounded amused, which Chaloner found far more disconcerting than anger or frustration. ‘I should have listened to him. No wonder Warwick wanted to carry these chests to the cellar himself – he was afraid we would notice something amiss if he let us do it.’

  ‘You must be disappointed.’ Chaloner laid Eleanore gently on the ground and climbed slowly to his feet. ‘Given that you have been planning this night since June. All those arrangements and expenses – and for nothing.’

  ‘Hardly for nothing,’ objected Sutcliffe, mockindignant. ‘We still have the Sick and Hurt Fund, which was our original objective, after all. We never imagined that the King’s gold would fall into our laps – not until a few days ago – so I am not unduly distraught about losing it. But how do you know we started planning our operation in June?’

  ‘My wife overheard you discussing it, probably during a performance of The Indian Queen. You must have gone to watch it with Dove and Dendy.’

  Sutcliffe frowned. ‘A small, pert lady in a green dress, who eavesdropped on us, even after one of the cast fell down dead? I tried to catch her, but she escaped. Was she a spy, too?’

  Chaloner did not answer. Hannah had been brave, risking her life to monitor dangerous men, and he felt a sudden surge of affection for her. She had even told him what Sutcliffe and his cronies had intended to steal – not the Treasury, as Reymes had only decided to move that when he had seen how safe the Sick and Hurt money was in the rectory.

  Then Strangeways stepped forward. ‘Which of you bastards is the Chelsea Strangler?’ he demanded. ‘Nancy was a good lass, and I will not let her murder go unpunished. I owe that at least to her sister.’

  ‘I am afraid you must look elsewhere for him,’ replied Sutcliffe evenly. ‘We aimed to avoid suspicious deaths in Chelsea, lest they brought unwanted attention.’

  Before the fishmonger could ask more, the rebels finished their conference and came to cluster at the assassin’s back. The rain began to fall harder.

  ‘We have made our decision,’ announced Say. ‘We will take the shillings from the cellar and quit the country. The Treasury … well, we are disinclined to chase it. The risk is just too great.’

  ‘You are not having the Sick and Hurt Fund,’ declared Reymes angrily.

  ‘You will lose if you fight us for it,’ warned Say. ‘But you might be able to save the Treasury. It is your choice, of course, but think very carefully before you decide.’

  ‘Do not take me for a fool,’ snarled Reymes. ‘Even if we did manage to defeat Warwick, you would just come along and take the gold from us. Well, we are not fighting your battles.’

  ‘We will not take it,’ said Sutcliffe. ‘You have my word.’

  ‘The word of a traitor,’ spat Reymes in rank contempt.

  ‘You can believe us,’ Say assured him. ‘Sutcliffe is wounded, and is in no condition for another skirmish, while the rest of us have had enough. All we want now is to leave unmolested.’

  ‘Although England has not seen the last of us yet,’ growled Lisle, suggesting that he had been willing to pursue the men who had outwitted them, but had been overruled by his more cautious companions. ‘Not by a long shot.’

  ‘Warwick cannot have gone far,’ said Sutcliffe to Reymes. ‘His carts will be slow, weighed down with heavy guineas. However, allow me to give you one piece of advice: do not roar your accusations at him like lions, or you will have half the thieves in the country after you. Whisper, if you can.’

  ‘What nonsense is this?’ demanded Reymes suspiciously. ‘If we whisper in this storm we—’

  The rest of his sentence was lost in an ear-splitting crack of thunder that proved his point.

  ‘Go,’ said Sutcliffe briskly. ‘And when you return, we will be gone.’

  Reymes started to refuse, but Strangeways approached him, rain bouncing off his breastplate with metallic pings.

  ‘Go after Warwick,’ he urged softly, ‘or all our efforts and sacrifices tonight will have been for nothing. You must save the gold.’

  Chaloner watched an inner battle rage within Reymes: the Sick and Hurt Fund or the Treasury? Unfortunately, there was only one real option – the one the King would want him to take – so Chaloner spoke before the commissioner could make the wrong decision.

  ‘We shall need horses,’ he said, although he resented the immediate flash of satisfaction in Sutcliffe’s eyes. ‘Fast ones. If you cannot provide them, we will stay here, and so will you.’

  He touched the sword at his side, to ensure they took his meaning, and Say hurried quickly towards the stables before they could change their minds.

  ‘Ride quickly,’ instructed Sutcliffe. ‘And make sure you kill the man who was a colleague and a friend, but who betrayed you without a qualm.’

  ‘Yes, Warwick will die tonight,’ spat Reymes. ‘Although I assure you, he was never a friend.’

  ‘Warwick is not the driving force behind this mischief,’ said Sutcliffe with a sly smirk. ‘Cocke was wrong to suspect him. Think rather of someone who can wrap Warwick around his little finger with his bluff good nature and charm. Someone who has two Court posts, but who is still fearful for his future.’

  Chaloner gaped at him. ‘You mean Kipps? No! He would never…’

  But then Hannah’s letter flashed into his mind yet again: Beware of smokey half-fisshe and Candels in Battell. The smokey half-fisshe – Kipps, the first part of the word kipper! And the Candels in Battell meant War-wick. Chaloner’s stomach lurched painfully. Surely she was mistaken! Yet she had been right about Sutcliffe, Dove and Dendy. With a sick, sinking feeling he supposed she must have overheard Kipps and Warwick plotting at Court, and sincerely hoped it had not been marriage to a spy that had prompted her to listen to conversations not intended for her ears.

  ‘Yes, Kipps,’ said Sutcliffe softly. ‘There is a sharp mind behind that bumbling exterior. How else could he have survived so long in the snake pit that is White Hall?’

  ‘No,’ said Reymes hoarsely. ‘He has gone to Hampton Court. If he had hatched such a terrible plot, he would be here to see it through.’

  ‘Believe what you like.’ Sutcliffe began to limp away. ‘But you will see.’
>
  Rain lashed down as Chaloner, Reymes and Greeting – the only three still capable of riding – galloped along the north road. The storm had turned it treacherously slippery, and lightning flashed almost continuously.

  Chaloner’s horse stumbled, almost unseating him, and he wondered what they would do if they did catch the carts. Try to reason with the culprits? But why would they listen? They would have professional soldiers to do their bidding – he was sure the real gold would not be guarded by peacocks who thought more of their uniforms than their martial abilities – and three tired men would pose no threat to them.

  Reymes forged ahead, fuelled by rage, and Chaloner knew he would be more liability than help in the skirmish that was to come. Then the commissioner reined in so abruptly that Chaloner almost crashed into the back of him. On the track ahead were two wagons, the front one tilted at an angle. At first, Chaloner assumed it had skidded into a ditch, but the lightning told a different story: a wheel had sheered off, and its guards were milling around it in dismay. They rallied at the sound of approaching hoofs, though, and all drew weapons.

  ‘Damn it, Tom!’ cried Kipps. ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘I might ask the same of you,’ said Chaloner, and although he had resigned himself to his friend’s treachery, he still experienced a sharp pang of regret at the sight of him there.

  ‘Was it you who sawed through the axle to prevent our escape?’ asked Kipps, eyeing him reproachfully. ‘How very unkind!’

  ‘Someone sawed through—’ began Chaloner, bemused, but Reymes cut across him.

  ‘So it is true? You do not deny it? You are stealing the King’s gold? I might have known! You are in Clarendon’s employ, after all, and he only ever hires rogues.’

  ‘And you are a better judge of character, are you?’ retorted Kipps archly. ‘You who trusted Doyley, Cocke, Tooker, Samm, Wilkinson, Franklin and all those brown-coats, when even a child could have seen that they were rogues.’

  Reymes opened his mouth to respond, but then could think of nothing with which to refute the charge. All Chaloner’s attention was on Kipps.

  ‘You must have been delighted when the Earl ordered you to help me with my investigations,’ he said bitterly. ‘It allowed you to stay one step ahead of me the whole way.’

  When the lightning flashed again, he saw that the Seal Bearer held a handgun. So did Warwick, who was gesturing for Reymes and Greeting to dismount. The secretary was grim-faced but determined, and Chaloner saw a resolve that had been absent in White Hall, when he had been nothing but a badly treated servant of the Crown.

  ‘Not really, Tom,’ Kipps was saying generously. ‘Most of your enquiries were irrelevant, because I had already guessed that Reymes would try to move the Treasury secretly, taking Warwick and me into his confidence only at the very last moment. It was obvious: keeping it in London while the plague edged ever closer was just too reckless, even for him.’

  ‘He said it would stay until August,’ added Warwick. ‘But we are not stupid – we knew it was a lie. And when Kipps saw the arrangements that had been put in place at the rectory, he understood exactly what was going to happen.’

  ‘You treacherous worms,’ snarled Reymes, clenching and unclenching his fists in impotent rage. ‘I was right to distrust you.’

  Kipps ignored him and continued to address Chaloner. ‘So do not feel too badly about failing to predict what we intended to do. We are clever, not like those fools at the rectory, and you did your best.’ Then he smirked, unable to resist a gloat. ‘Of course, you never came close to learning anything that mattered.’

  ‘Anything that mattered,’ repeated Chaloner, climbing slowly off his horse when Warwick wagged the pistol at him. ‘Like murder.’

  ‘Murder?’ echoed Kipps, although the unease in his voice gave Chaloner all he needed to slot the last pieces of the puzzle into place.

  ‘Yes – it was you who strangled Nancy, Underhill, Kole and Parker. To protect yourself.’

  ‘Kipps is the Chelsea Strangler?’ Reymes eyed the Seal Bearer with renewed contempt. ‘Is no filthy deed beneath him?’

  ‘Nancy spent a lot of time looking out of her window with Frances’ telescope,’ Chaloner continued when Kipps made no attempt to deny the charge. ‘Not at the rectory, as I first assumed, but at the north road, which you would have surveyed thoroughly before using it to escape.’

  ‘I am a careful man.’ Kipps glanced ruefully at the damaged cart. ‘Although not careful enough, it seems. I was sorry about Nancy, but I could not have her telling Frances about me.’

  ‘Underhill was Spymaster Williamson’s man, and you certainly did not want him poking about in Chelsea,’ Chaloner went on. ‘It was a godsend when he visited Clarendon House, allowing you to dispatch him in a place you know better than your own home. Meanwhile, Kole liked looking through keyholes, hoping to see naked women—’

  ‘A nasty habit,’ said Kipps. A flash of lightning illuminated his hands, which were strong and capable – a strangler’s hands. ‘And one I was unable to ignore, given what we planned to do.’

  ‘The spectre never visited Kole in his room the night he died. You made that up to confuse me. What about Parker? Did he deduce the truth in his coffee-aggravated delirium? Is that why you stole whatever he was writing?’

  Kipps inclined his head. ‘He was putting his suspicions about me in a letter to the Earl when I arrived. Thank you for not rushing to speak to him at once, by the way. That would have been awkward. And thank you for disappearing on business of your own early that morning, giving me the opportunity to dispatch him at my leisure.’

  ‘Cocke knew you were a man with secrets, and I should have listened to him. Did he really blackmail you about Martin, or was that a lie, too?’

  An expression of pain crossed Kipps’ face. ‘No, that was true. He was a vile man – a thief, who stole Gorges’ money and plotted with rebels.’

  ‘Yes,’ agreed Chaloner. ‘But no worse than one who could not look his victims in the face when he squeezed the life out of them, and so attacked them from behind.’

  Kipps shuddered. ‘It was not something I enjoyed, so I hope I shall not be obliged to do it again.’ Then he brightened. ‘So why not come with us? I have no wish to harm a friend, and you are as weary of White Hall as I am. Nothing holds you there now that Hannah is gone.’

  ‘That is a tempting offer,’ said Greeting quickly, although Chaloner doubted he had been included in the invitation. ‘I would not mind—’

  ‘No,’ barked Warwick, teeth clacking angrily. ‘None of them can come. It is too risky.’

  ‘We would not demean ourselves anyway,’ said Reymes, all haughty contempt. ‘We would sooner die than throw in our lot with scum like you.’

  ‘That can be arranged,’ muttered Warwick.

  Chaloner was struggling to understand why Kipps was willing to abandon all he professed to hold dear. ‘You have two good Court posts, a nice family, you are popular … you have so much to lose.’

  ‘We were left behind to die.’ It was Warwick who answered, and the words emerged as a snarl. ‘We have given the best years of our lives to the King, but he left us in plague-infested London without a qualm. Well, we are not expendable. This money will allow us to live comfortably for the rest of our lives, and to Hell with him.’

  ‘Besides, better we have it than those lunatics in the Garden Court,’ added Kipps. ‘They aimed to use it to start another civil war.’

  ‘You are fools if you think you will get away with this,’ said Reymes tightly. ‘Do you really imagine that no one will notice your sudden riches? You will be caught in an instant!’

  ‘No, we will not,’ stated Warwick. ‘And if you had not sawed through the axle, we would not even be having this stupid conversation. We would be long gone.’

  ‘We did not touch the carts,’ said Chaloner. ‘That was Sutcliffe. I wondered why he was so sure we would catch up with you. He knew something would happen to slow you…’

  H
e trailed off, recalling what else the assassin had said: that they should speak in low voices so that no one would hear them. But who would be listening in the marshes in the middle of the night? The answer was that no one would, and that Sutcliffe had wanted them close to the vehicles for some other reason. He began to back away, and as he did so, he saw the Treasury’s Sergeant at Arms darting away through the trees.

  ‘Stephens!’ bawled Warwick. ‘What do you think you are doing? Come back here at once!’

  ‘What is he—’ began Kipps, then his eyes narrowed. ‘Stop him, Warwick! Shoot!’

  As one, he and Warwick took aim and pulled their triggers. His shot went wide, while Warwick’s weapon failed to discharge – rain had leaked into his powder.

  The remaining Treasury men began to babble in confusion, so Chaloner used the opportunity to turn and run, pulling Reymes and Greeting with him. Two musket shots followed, but neither came close to hitting their targets. Then there was an explosion so violent and massive that the ground bucked beneath their feet, sending them all sprawling. They cowered, hands over their heads, as a lethal hail of coins and debris hammered down around them.

  It felt like an age before it was safe to get up. Chaloner stood cautiously, aware of Reymes and Greeting doing the same. Several trees were alight, which shed enough light for them to see that one of the carts was no longer there. It had been replaced by an enormous crater in the ground.

  ‘Christ God!’ breathed Reymes. ‘How did you know that was going to happen?’

  ‘Sutcliffe’s parting words,’ explained Chaloner. ‘He should have resisted the temptation to gloat, because I guessed what he had done, even before I saw his spy haring away after lighting the fuses. He wanted everyone dead – the thieves and us.’

  ‘But how did he guess what Warwick and Kipps intended to do?’ asked Greeting shakily. ‘I thought he was as astonished as the rest of us when the crates at the rectory contained dirt.’

  ‘Not quite,’ said Chaloner, ‘because Cocke had already warned him that Warwick was untrustworthy. Indeed, I suspect that Cocke’s concern prompted Sutcliffe to recruit a spy from among the Treasury men.’