by Will Thomas
“Do you suppose she’s as barmy as Pritchard?”
“I’ve been in a room with her,” I answered, remembering the feel of her scalpel on my flesh. “She might be worse than he is.”
“Why did he hook up with her, then, if indeed that is what happened?”
“She was a means to an end. I think that he was looking for someone malleable and willing to do anything for him. Unless, of course, she was merely a mercenary who was after the money. Miss Fletcher said Camille has been spending money freely all over London. That would seem consistent with a person who had been incarcerated and unable to enjoy some of the finer things in life.”
“Are you sure Miss Muffet’s on her way to New Forest? I don’t feel the need to take the air for my health.”
“Have you ever gambled with a handful of seemingly random cards and found yourself with a low straight?”
He clapped me on the back. “Boy, you do know poker!”
“I prefer whist, but I have tried a hand or two.”
* * *
After a couple of hours we arrived in New Forest and hailed a cab at the station. We were perhaps a few miles away when we first heard the din. I turned my head and looked over my shoulder.
“Bells!” I cried. “Someone has escaped!”
“Faster, man, faster!” Caleb called to the cabman.
The man whistled and snapped his whip and the horses doubled their speed. A mile flew by, then another half mile, and soon we came upon men dressed in gray guards’ uniforms milling about. A few of them raised rifles at our approach. We pulled up and stood in front of them.
“We’re hunting Henry Thayer Pritchard,” I said.
“So are we,” a guard replied.
“Is your warden here?” I asked. “Or someone in charge?”
“Dr. Lewis is standing by the front gate, waiting for the authorities. A man was found murdered.”
“Was his throat cut, perhaps?” Caleb drawled.
“Yes, sir. As a matter of fact, it was.”
“I thought as much.”
“Gentlemen,” the guard said. “I must take you to him, not knowing how the two of you are related to this incident.”
“We want to see Dr. Lewis ourselves,” I said. “Please lead the way.”
When we reached the front gate, we were taken to see Dr. Lewis himself, who was directing the efforts to find Pritchard. Lewis was sturdy in a double-breasted suit and heavy brogues. He was a no-nonsense fellow, clean shaven, with short gray hair. I showed him my identification and explained our connection to the case.
“Who was found dead?” I asked the director.
“A stranger was found near the front gate,” he replied. “A tall man with no papers of identification on him.”
“Did he have a mustache?”
“Yes, he did. It was small and waxed.”
I looked at Caleb. “The other Mercier brother.”
“Dr. Pritchard has a knack for losing friends,” Caleb remarked.
“Why are the bells ringing if the body is right here?” I asked.
“Pritchard escaped not more than an hour ago,” Dr. Lewis replied. “He fled into the old Matley Wood with a former inmate.”
“Is her name Camille?”
“You seem to know a great deal for a man who just arrived here.”
“What is her surname, may I ask? Is it Perrine?” I remembered the note I had been given by Inspector Dacre at the Sûreté, stating that Perrine’s daughter, Camille, had visited him in prison.
“In fact, her name is Ainsworth.”
I suspected the girl lived in a world of aliases.
“My employer, Mr. Cyrus Barker, was the enquiry agent responsible for Pritchard’s arrest. We believe Pritchard has been planning his escape for a long time. How did he escape?”
“There is a tunnel which comes out against the wall there, near those bushes. No one thought to look there because it is the farthest from Pritchard’s cell. The tunnel must have taken years to dig.”
“What do you know about Miss Ainsworth’s relationship with Dr. Pritchard?”
“She was a patient here, in the women’s ward,” he answered. “She was committed after she murdered a man. I don’t know how she communicated with Dr. Pritchard. The men and women are kept strictly segregated.”
“It seems to me,” Caleb said, “that this fellow has a knack for doing the impossible.”
“He has not been a model prisoner, but he earned enough responsibility to be able to walk around the grounds on his own. He showed remorse for what he had done to his wives, and with his medical skills he has been able to treat other patients with minor injuries. We are understaffed and it seemed a good use of his abilities.”
I thought Lewis a fool for allowing Pritchard to walk around the grounds and to interact freely with the other inmates, particularly with a medical bag. Not only did Pritchard have no remorse, he was probably incapable of it. Such a clever killer should never have left his cell unless under restraint. I had no respect for the latest scientific methods of treating prisoners.
“Is the forest being searched?” I asked.
“Of course,” Lewis replied. “With dogs. However, it’s bog land, and it’s dangerous to walk among the moss and hillocks. One can easily be sucked down and drowned.”
“Thank you for the information, sir. We volunteer for whatever service we can give.”
“Thank you. We are working our way carefully around the edges of the forest and making sorties inside.”
I nodded and followed after Lewis. We reached the edge of the forest and I peered in. Every tree trunk, every inch of ground, every rock, was covered in a thick, bilious layer of green moss. Frogs jumped into stagnant pools, and sphagnum hung over us like flailing arms.
“Oy!” a voice echoed through the forest.
We backed out, retracing our steps, and ran around the edge of the forest, trying to follow the sound. Gingerly, we made our way over slick, twisted knots of tree roots whence the voices came. We saw men circled inside and soon reached them. On the edge of a swampy pool, there were two small objects on the forest floor: a pair of green snakeskin boots. Women’s boots.
“Those belonged to Camille Ainsworth,” I said. “They match the dress she was wearing this morning.”
The men looked at one another, and then a constable stepped forward to dare enter the bog. His comrades tied a stout rope around his waist and, taking a deep breath, he stepped into the pool.
He sunk to his knees immediately. There was no solid ground to cling to, nor water to swim through. It was a spongy mass trying to suck him down to his doom.
“Pull him out!” Dr. Lewis ordered, but the constable, whose name I learned later was Burroughs, held up a hand.
“A minute, sir! A minute! I know these pools since a lad.”
He leaned forward, staining his crisp black suit, and thrust his arm into the vile water. We all took hold of the rope, preparing to pull him out. He flailed his arms about in the pea-green water.
“Now!” he cried, and we pulled with all our might. It had been a long while since I’d played tug-of-war, but the mechanics were the same. We pulled him from the bog inch by inch, and as he came he dragged a horrid, shapeless mass with him. When both were on solid land I took my handkerchief and wiped the muddy face, in order to see the features.
“It is Camille Ainsworth.”
Her hair was slick with mud, her sightless eyes staring from a pale, soiled face. That nose would bewitch no man ever again.
“Dr. Pritchard has buried another wife,” I murmured.
She had been insane. She had threatened my fiancée. The girl would have flayed me alive if given the chance. And yet I felt for that poor mad creature, used as a pawn, having fallen victim to the worst woman-killer in England.
I turned to say something to Caleb and found him gone. I wondered if he was connected to the case. For all I knew, he was escaping with Pritchard.
“Has anyone seen Caleb Barke
r?” I asked.
We all turned to look, but he was nowhere to be found. The mood of the party of men had begun to turn dark. One does not kill a woman and sink her in a bog. Not in England.
Dr. Lewis frowned. “Mr. Llewelyn, where is your companion?”
“I don’t know, but I suspect he has gone after Pritchard himself.”
We began to search for Pritchard, but it had been an hour since he had escaped, and if he knew his way through the bogs, there would be no way to know how far ahead he was, and no way to find him now.
I turned to one of the guards and asked to borrow his spyglass. I scanned the bog, looking for some sort of movement. It occurred to me that Caleb would look for the tallest tree in order to spot his quarry. My instinct was correct. I found him perched in a tall oak a couple of hundred yards distant. He seemed to be reaching for something inside his coat.
I ran to the foot of the tree and called up to him, but Caleb showed no sign of hearing me. He climbed ever upward. When he had reached the point beyond which he dared not climb, he wrapped a leg around a limb and leaned forward, pulling out a small metal shaft. As we watched, he began to assemble a rifle from parts inside the pockets of his duster coat, still dangling from his precarious position. There was silence in the clearing. We all looked up expectantly.
“There he is,” Caleb said in a low voice. “He looks like he’s just taking a walk in the woods. What say ye, gents? Shall I spoil his outing?”
There was a murmured agreement from all the men, especially Constable Burroughs, who had taken the fate of the dead woman seriously.
“Caleb, come down,” I cried. “What do you intend to do?”
In answer, Barker’s brother began screwing a wooden stock into the cylinder, and then affixed a sight atop it. My attempts to stop him were to no avail. The men began to encourage him now. Two of the guards took me by the shoulders, and I almost feared being thrown into the bog myself.
Caleb sighted for a full minute before pulling the trigger. The sound echoed through the forest. We all waited expectantly down below. Pritchard was at least half a mile away.
“Got ’im,” he murmured after he took the shot. “That’s for you, little brother.”
All the men around us cheered.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
The strain of pulling Camille Ainsworth from the grip of the bog had proven too much for my injuries. I had bled through my shirt and could not travel. We found a hotel and a local doctor who gave me a few stitches. I ate a little food and went to bed. Caleb Barker met with some of the guards from the asylum, who paid for his drinks. I awoke the next morning stiff and sore, aware that in twenty-four hours I was to walk the aisle with Rebecca Cowan. We had a big breakfast and arrived shortly after lunch.
We were gathered in the sitting room that afternoon, Caleb and I in chairs at the side of Barker’s bed. Caleb was his usual laconic self, indifferent to our opinions. In his mind he had done the right thing, and he was pleased with the result. His brother was not so sure, although under the circumstances he could not admit he would have handled it any differently. And I? I was relieved it was over, and trying to justify in my mind what had happened.
Pritchard had already killed three women, his brides, for their insurance money. He had tried to kill us. He had murdered Anatole Mercier and Camille Ainsworth. It might be difficult to prove, but I was certain he was also responsible for the death of Henry Strathmore.
Barker pushed his blankets down, his pale feet protruding from his nightshirt. He was running over things in his mind. We all were.
“They won’t be long.”
We knew he was speaking of Captain Yeager and the United States Marines, who were certain to arrest Caleb for murdering Pritchard and several others.
“I know that,” Caleb rasped. He finished rolling a cigarette and struck a vesta underneath his chair.
“So, will you tell me now?” the Guv asked.
“Tell you what?”
“What you are not telling me, of course. I know you, Caleb. Something is happening. You completed your mission down south. You should have been in Chicago by now, getting your new assignment. Neither of us is sentimental, so there is nothing to keep you here.”
“Well, that’s a fine how-do-you-do,” Caleb answered. “I don’t know why I bother helping you at all!”
“You’re obfuscating. You know I’ll find out eventually.”
Caleb said nothing, puffing on his cigarette and looking at a corner of the ceiling. Ten seconds went by. Twenty. Finally, he sighed.
“Oh, very well. My first assignment here was to protect McCloskey, which didn’t quite work out. My second was to scout property for Mr. Pinkerton.”
“For a European branch of the Pinkerton Agency?” my employer asked.
“Yes, the first branch outside of the U.S. The boss wanted to buy some of the Earl of Harrington’s holdings. He was going to offer top dollar, too.”
“By the telephone exchange?” Barker asked.
“Wait, you mean in Craig’s Court?” I nearly yelled.
“Yep,” Caleb said. “This is the street of detectives in London. What better place for us to hang our shingle?”
I couldn’t believe it. An American agency, a large organization, would drive us out of business, or at least steal away our clientele. People like Hewitt and Fletcher would lose their livelihoods. What kind of work would I find if we shut our doors permanently?
“Hmmm,” the Guv said. “The one at the end of the court?”
“Yes,” Caleb drawled.
“He’ll never get it. I suspect it’s owned by the government.”
“That’s what I found out. No one actually refused me, but there was always a new document to sign, and information to obtain, and then a form went missing. What in the hell is that building, anyway?”
Barker shrugged. “As far as I know, it is vacant.”
I think I can tell when the Guv is not telling the whole truth. The thought that Barker might not know about a mysterious building in his own yard, so to speak, was suspicious.
“Hmm,” Caleb said.
“Did you telegram Pinkerton?”
“I did,” he said, leaning forward and putting out his cigarette in the ashtray.
Now that Mac was back, he had taken measures to prevent having Caleb’s ashes all over the house.
“And what did you say?”
“I told him Scotland Yard was not pleased to have such an organization within arm’s reach. It seemed as good an excuse as any.”
“I can get them to corroborate your statement,” Barker said, absently scratching under his chin.
“I suggested Paris; for now, anyway. We’ll come eventually. The boss always gets what he wants.”
“You wanted that to happen?” I asked, feeling the anger begin to rise in me.
“’Course not. I was in a strange city on an assignment. I assumed Cyrus was dead years ago. How was I to know he would be here and in the same street where I was ordered to look? We may be estranged, but we’re kin, and blood is blood. I’d better pack.”
“Lad, you’d better go get Caleb’s horse.”
“I … yes, sir.”
I patted Harm, the nonspeaking member of the party, who was watching us sagely, on the head. Then I left through the back gate. As I walked along the Old Kent Road on sore and bandaged limbs, I considered the situation. Caleb had done a number of things of which Her Majesty’s government might not approve, not to mention the American government. He was close to starting an international incident all by himself.
Once back in Lion Street with Pepper, I brought him to the front door and tied him to a post. Then I went inside, just in time to see the brothers shaking hands.
“Take care of yourself, little brother,” Caleb said.
“A letter every year or so would not come amiss,” Barker rumbled. He turned his head and looked out the window. “Ah! Here they come, just as expected.”
“Adios.”
“Go with God, indeed.”
“A Bible thumper to the last, eh?” he chuckled as he gathered his saddlebags and stepped outside.
“Go with him to the embassy, Thomas,” the Guv instructed. “You are representing the agency. Mac! Top hat!”
Mac came out of his room and jammed the hat onto my head. I followed after Caleb.
There was a brougham in the street in front of the house. Three men were trying to work out how to tie the gelding to the back of such a fine vehicle. There was some kind of gold insignia on the cab door, but I didn’t have time to inspect it.
“I’m coming with you,” I called.
“And who are you, sir?” one of the men demanded. He was sturdy and bearded and very serious. I recognized him as a Scotland Yard inspector, having seen him once or twice in “A” Division.
“Thomas Llewelyn,” I said. “I work for Mr. Barker. Cyrus Barker. His brother, Caleb, here worked for us.”
The inspector turned and regarded Captain Yeager, who was standing behind him. He was holding Pepper’s reins, still trying to work out where to tie them.
“There’s no room,” he snapped. “You can ride the horse, Mr. Llewelyn.”
They put darbies on Caleb’s wrists and pushed him into the brougham, and climbed in after him. I mounted Pepper and they rolled slowly out of Lion Street, with me following behind them.
I jogged over Westminster Bridge and passed the Abbey, where we all turned into Victoria Street, approaching number 123. It was one of the easier addresses in London to memorize. I followed the carriage up to the large granite mansion with the American flag flying in front of it, alternating stripes of red and white, with white stars on a field of blue. The carriage rolled to a stop and I came up behind it. Pepper nickered his opinion of the place and shook his head.
The inspector, having acquitted himself of his duty, left for Scotland Yard. If he were like all the other inspectors of the Met, he had far too many cases to dawdle over the delivery of an errant American. One of the men remained with the carriage, while Captain Yeager led us inside. I must admit he cut a fine figure. There was white piping all over his blue uniform, and I could have hung my hat on that curled mustache. I had been in enough embassies to not be particularly impressed by the decor, but for such a young country, they were doing well for themselves.