by C. S. Harris
“Hayes was with you?”
Tintwhistle nodded. “Normally I liked to work alone, ye see. But that young nob, ’e insisted on comin’ in wit me.”
“I suspect he wanted to maintain control over what you lifted.”
Mott Tintwhistle gave a heavy sigh of longing undiminished by the passage of years. “Wouldn’t let me take nothin’. Coulda been set fer life, I coulda, if I’d ’ad me way.”
“So what did you take?”
“Next t’ nothin’! ’E wanted me t’ break into a strongbox in the old man’s library. Like somethin’ out o’ the Dark Ages, it was, covered wit strips o’ iron and bolted t’ the floor in a cupboard. When I first seen it, I says, ‘Jig’s up, me lad; I ain’t clever enough t’ git us into that. I’ve heard o’ these things, and they take one o’ them fancy keys ye gotta insert jist right.’ But ’e says no, it’s all a hum, that what looks like a keyhole is jist fer show. And then ’e slides away this bit o’ brass and I see there’s this other hidden keyhole, and sure enough, me lockpick opens it real easy.”
Sebastian poured the cracksman another drink. “What was inside?”
“Next t’ nothin’. Jist some papers and an old watch.”
“Some papers and a watch? No banknotes?”
“Nope. Jist the watch.”
“What was he expecting to find?”
“That’s what ’e said ’e wanted—the watch. Said it was ’is by rights, given t’ ’im by ’is granddaddy when ’e was a wee tyke. Said they was always real fond o’ each other, and ’e weren’t gonna let ’is da keep the watch jist t’ be mean.”
“You didn’t help yourself to anything else on the way out?”
A sly smile slid across the old man’s face. “Well, maybe I tried t’ lift a purdy little statue that was jist sittin’ there by the door. But Hayes seen me and made me put it back.”
“And that was it?”
“That was it.”
“You didn’t take any banknotes?”
Tintwhistle’s eyes bulged. “No. Not sayin’ I wouldna taken ’em if I’d seen ’em, but there weren’t none.”
“When was the last time you saw Hayes?”
“Me? Come into the shop jist this last week, ’e did.”
“He did?”
“Aye. Meybe Tuesday or Wednesday.”
“Alone?”
“Well, ’e ’ad a little nipper wit ’im. Can’t remember the lad’s name. Real quiet and polite, ’e was.”
“Do you know where the boy is now?”
Tintwhistle gave him a blank look. “No. Why would I?”
“The child is missing.”
“Huh. Don’t know nothin’ about that.”
“Why did Hayes come to see you?”
Tintwhistle looked vaguely affronted. “Wot ye think? That a feller cain’t stop by t’ see an old friend?”
“I was under the impression yours was more of a business relationship than a friendship.”
“Well that jist goes to show wot ye know, don’t it? Tried to ’elp ’im, I did, when the constables jumped ’im in Smithfield that day. Weren’t no use, of course. But ’e come by t’ thank me fer it anyway.”
“I’ve heard that Hayes’s cousin, Ethan, told the authorities to look for him in Smithfield.”
“That’s right.”
“Did Hayes know that?”
“Sure enough did. Swore ’e’d kill the man too if’n ’e ever got the chance.”
“He did?”
“Course ’e did. Who wouldn’t?”
“He told you when he came to your shop that he was planning to kill Seaforth?”
“What? No, I’m talkin’ about what he said all them years ago, when they was gonna hang him.”
“So the only reason Hayes came to see you at your dolly shop was to thank you for trying to help him eighteen years ago?”
“That’s right.”
“Did you see him again?”
“Why would I?”
Which wasn’t, Sebastian noted, precisely the same as saying no. He reached for the bottle and topped up the man’s glass. “You heard that Hayes was murdered two days ago?”
“Aye.”
“Who do you think killed him?”
Sebastian expected the man to say, How the blazes would I know? Instead, Tintwhistle laid a finger along the side of his nose and said, “Who ye think?”
“I honestly have no idea.”
“Huh.” The retired cracksman leaned forward and dropped his voice. “Seen somebody, I did, when ’is nibs was in the shop. Somebody I recognized. Looked t’ me like ’e was followin’ ’im.”
“Someone was following Nicholas Hayes?”
“That’s right.”
“Do you know this person’s name?”
Tintwhistle turned his head and spat on the floor. “Lots o’ folks know that cove. Used t’ be a Bow Street Runner, ’e did. If’n there was any justice in this world, they’d ’ave ’anged ’im fer murder. But there ain’t no such thing as justice in England. Not fer poor folk like us.”
Sebastian shook his head. “Who did you see?”
“Poole. Titus Poole.”
“Never heard of him.”
Tintwhistle stared at Sebastian. “Ye ain’t? Well, I wish I ain’t neither—that’s fer certain.”
“This Titus Poole was following Hayes?”
“That’s what I’m sayin’.”
“You’re certain?”
“Sure enough looked that way t’ me.”
“Why would Poole be following Nicholas Hayes?”
“Reckon somebody was payin’ ’im. Why else? That’s wot Poole does these days, ye know. Hear tell ’e makes more money now than ’e ever did as a Runner.”
Sebastian studied the ex-cracksman’s alcohol-ravaged face. “Who do you think was paying him?”
“Somebody wanted Hayes out o’ the way, I reckon.”
“You’re suggesting someone paid Poole to kill Hayes?”
Tintwhistle sniffed. “Seems likely t’ me. Don’t it t’ you? Otherwise, why didn’t ’e just nab ’im and ’and ’im over t’ Bow Street?”
“Did you tell Hayes someone was following him?”
“I did.”
“And?”
“’E said he knowed it. Didn’t know the feller’s name till I told ’im, though.”
“Did he say who he thought might be paying the man to follow him?”
Tintwhistle laughed. “Said he reckoned it could be any one of four people. But he didn’t name ’em.”
Sebastian watched the man purse his lips and squint as he drained his glass again. “So why did Hayes really come to see you?”
“I told ye: ’E wanted t’ thank me.”
“You weren’t tempted to turn him in?”
Tintwhistle’s eyes bulged. “Hell, no. Grace’d gut me fer even thinkin’ o’ such a thing.”
Sebastian refilled the man’s glass. “Do you know why Hayes came back to England?”
“Said ’e ’ad somethin’ ’e ’ad t’ do. I didn’t ask ’im what. Ain’t too hard t’ figure out, though, if’n ye gets me drift?”
“You mean, you think he came back here to kill someone.”
“Ain’t no other reason I can think of, now, is there? Well, is there?”
“Who do you think he came to kill?”
“That cousin o’ ’is, of course.”
“Can you think of anyone else?”
“Well, if I were ’im, I reckon meybe I’d wanna kill me da too. That old Earl was one nasty son of a bitch. But he’s already dead, ain’t ’e?”
“How about someone Hayes quarreled with while at the Red Lion? Anyone?”
“Nah. Weren’t a real quarrelsome fellow, ’is nibs.”
“He was convicted of murder.”
“Yeah. Well, sometimes things happen different from what we expect ’em to.” Tintwhistle emptied his glass again and squinted at the brandy bottle. “Anythin’ left in there?”
* * *
“Four men?” said Hero after Sebastian relayed the conversation to her when they were alone after dinner. “Hayes told Tintwhistle any one of four men could have hired the ex-Runner to follow him?”
“Four,” said Sebastian. They were sitting in the drawing room, Hero drinking a cup of tea with the cat on her lap, Sebastian with a glass of port. “Seaforth and LaRivière, obviously, and possibly Brownbeck. He seems a bit of a stretch, although he could have feared Hayes was nursing a grudge over his refusal to allow him to marry Kate. But that still leaves one.”
“The fourth could be Forbes.”
Sebastian took a slow sip of his port. “Perhaps. Hayes did once run off with the man’s wife, but it also seems something of a stretch.” He swirled the dark fortified wine in his glass. “The problem is, why didn’t whoever hired Titus Poole simply turn Hayes over to the authorities rather than setting an ex-Runner to follow him?”
“Perhaps that was the intent. But then Hayes confronted Poole and was killed in the resultant struggle.”
“It’s a scenario that would make more sense if Hayes hadn’t been hit in the back with a sickle.”
“There is that.” Hero sipped her tea in silence for a moment. “It’s interesting that, unlike Lady Forbes, Mott Tintwhistle had no trouble at all believing that Nicholas Hayes came back to London to kill someone.”
“I suspect that, in some ways, Tintwhistle knew Hayes’s capacity for violence far better than the former Miss Kate Brownbeck.”
“Do you believe Tintwhistle’s claim that they broke into the old Earl of Seaforth’s house simply to take a watch?”
“It seems a reckless thing to do, I’ll admit. But then, Nicholas was only twenty—and very, very angry with his father. So I can see it, yes.”
The cat jumped down, and Hero rose from her chair to go stand at the bowed front window overlooking the street. The window was open to the evening air in the hopes of catching a breeze, but the room was still hot.
She was silent for a moment, her gaze on the street below. Then she said, “I keep looking, hoping he’ll come back—Ji, I mean. I don’t understand why he is staying away from Grace and Jules Calhoun.”
“It doesn’t make sense unless he’s afraid.”
“Of what?”
“Someone who knew about his ties to both Chick Lane and this house. Someone like Titus Poole and whoever hired him.”
She glanced over at him. “If Ji is Hayes’s son—and if Hayes somehow managed to marry the boy’s mother and Ji can prove it—he would be the rightful heir to his grandfather’s earldom, would he not?”
“I think he’d have a very good case to make. And it might explain one thing that’s been bothering me.”
“What’s that?”
“Why Hayes brought the child back to England with him.”
She drew a deep breath. “Would Seaforth do such a thing, do you think? Kill both Nicholas and that little boy, I mean.”
“To keep his titles and estates?” Sebastian drained his port and set aside the glass. “I don’t think he’s a particularly evil man, but he is weak. And weak men can do some surprisingly evil things when they convince themselves that they’re the victims in a situation—which they are very good at doing.”
“Dear God,” whispered Hero, her gaze on the dark, hot street below. “Where is that poor child?”
Chapter 23
Sunday, 12 June
T itus Poole?” said Sir Henry Lovejoy when Sebastian stopped by the Bow Street magistrate’s Russell Square house that Sunday morning. “Don’t tell me he’s mixed up in this.”
“That’s what I’m hearing,” said Sebastian, taking the seat Lovejoy indicated. The morning breeze blowing in through the parlor’s open windows was already hot. “What can you tell me about him?”
Lovejoy rubbed his eyes with a splayed thumb and forefinger. “I’m surprised you haven’t heard of the man. He was considered a genius when it came to tracking down and catching thieves. Up until five years ago, he was Bow Street’s most famous Runner.”
“Five years ago I was in Portugal.”
“Ah. That explains it.”
“So what happened?”
“Unfortunately, it became apparent that he owed much of his vaunted success to a habit of framing vagrants and lying at their trials. He was never prosecuted, I’m afraid—the last thing Bow Street wanted was to have one of their Runners linked to the kinds of perversions of justice associated with eighteenth-century thieftakers like Jonathan Wild and Quilt Arnold.” Lovejoy gave a faint shake of his head. “I understand the desire to protect the Public Office, but at the same time I can’t help but believe it was a mistake—in addition to being a serious failure of justice. The man left with his reputation intact and now enjoys a lucrative career as a private thieftaker.”
Despite the establishment of the Bow Street Runners as a quasi police force, private thieftakers were still active in London and the surrounding counties. Typically they received fees for returning stolen goods to their original owners. But they also had a reputation for running protection rackets and lending their expertise to rich men with little respect for the law.
Sebastian said, “It’s been suggested that someone was paying Poole to follow Nicholas Hayes.”
“How odd. If someone knew Hayes had returned to England, why not simply inform the authorities and have the man taken up?”
“That I can’t explain, but I suspect Poole could. Do you have any idea where I might find him?”
“Last I heard he’d married a woman who owns an inn in Warwick Lane, just south of Newgate Street. The Bell, I believe it’s called.”
Sebastian studied the magistrate’s strained features. The graft and corruption of London’s public officials had long been a source of severe aggravation to Lovejoy. “Could Poole kill, do you think? In cold blood?”
“The man’s lies sent a dozen or more innocent men, women, and children to the gallows. I can’t see someone like that balking at murder, can you?”
“No,” said Sebastian.
Lovejoy reached for a small notebook lying on the table beside him and flipped it open to a marked page. “So far we’ve discovered no reasonable explanation for Pennington’s death other than the possibility that he saw Hayes’s killer that night. We’ve also found that Lord Seaforth did indeed spend Thursday afternoon and evening at his club before leaving directly for Carlton House, while the Count de Compans dined with the Regent himself that evening. So both men have solid alibis.”
“It sounds like it. Although that’s less significant when you consider that either man could have hired Poole to do his killing for him.”
Lovejoy sighed. “True. I’ve also heard back from the lads who were trying to find Hayes’s ship. Turns out only two ships from Canton have docked in London in the last several months: the Dover Castle and the Morning. Both arrived in a convoy with three whalers this past Monday.”
“That’s too late. Hayes was here before then.”
“I thought so. There was another convoy of three ships in May—the Clyde, the Earl of Abergavanney, and the Broxbornebury. All three struck the Shambles off the Isle of Portland in a dense fog. The Broxbornebury and Clyde sank in the bay with great loss of life, but the Earl of Abergavanney managed to limp into Weymouth.”
“That sounds like it’s probably our ship.”
Lovejoy nodded. “I’ve sent inquiries to the authorities in Weymouth, to see what they can discover. Presumably Hayes and this child traveled up to London by stage.” He paused. “No luck yet finding the boy?”
“None. Which is worrisome, given that even if the la
d doesn’t know whom Hayes was meeting that night, he presumably knows where Hayes went and whom he saw after coming up to London. And that means he could be a threat to this killer.”
“Perhaps that’s why he’s hiding—because he knows he’s in danger.”
Sebastian hesitated a moment, then said, “I’ve discovered nothing definitive one way or the other, but it seems reasonable to suppose that the child could very well be Hayes’s son. And if he’s legitimate . . .”
Lovejoy stared at him. “Merciful heavens.” He was silent for a moment, absorbing the various implications of this possibility. Then he said it again. “Merciful heavens.”
The ancient, winding street known as Warwick Lane ran south from Newgate Street toward St. Paul’s Cathedral. Dominated by the fine octagonal dome of Wren’s famous Royal College of Physicians, this was an area frequented by booksellers from Paternoster Row and busy with traffic going to and from the Warrick Arms, a famous coaching inn. But the looming nearby presence of Newgate Prison and the law courts of the Old Bailey cast something of a pall over the district—that, and the pervasive stench of raw meat from Newgate Market.
The Bell Inn was built around a narrow yard reached through an archway opposite Warwick Square. Dating to the time of Charles II, it was a small but reasonably respectable hostelry, with stables that stretched along the yard’s eastern side. Titus Poole himself was in the yard talking to a coal monger when Sebastian walked up to him.
A balding man in his late thirties, the former Bow Street Runner was a good four inches taller than Sebastian and big boned, with a slablike face and small dark eyes that narrowed at Sebastian’s approach. “I know who ye are,” said Poole, turning away from the coal man. “Yer that viscount. Devlin, ain’t it?”
“That’s right. You’re Titus Poole?”
Poole used his tongue to poke at the wad of chewing tobacco distending one cheek. “And if I am?”
“I’d like to know how you came to be following Nicholas Hayes.”
“What makes ye think I was?”
“You were seen.”
“Ah.” Poole shifted the tobacco from one cheek to the other. “Just so happens I spotted him in Smithfield Market. Thought I recognized him, so I followed him.”