The Masters of Bow Street

by John Creasey

  But at long last sufficient troops were summoned, it was said, by the King’s command. Gradually they forced the rioters back and thinned their ranks; gradually the noise and fury abated.

  While James, back in the House of Commons, was haunted day and night by one man’s voice: the voice of his half brother.

  ‘Ben, there is no doubt of it,’ James said on the morning of June 9, the first day after the back of the riots had been broken. ‘It was Johnny. And unless he is caught he will try to organise another revolt, another riot as bloody as this one.’

  ‘What do you want me to do?’ Benedict Sly asked.

  He had not slept except for odd hours during the whole seven days of the rioting. Now his eyes looked like glass, his cheeks were hollow, and his face had no colour at all. He had not washed and had hardly eaten. Nor had the men with him, setting type, running the machines, bundling up edition after edition as each came off the press.

  ‘Print Johnny’s likeness and name him as the ringleader,’ James replied.

  ‘Must it be you who has to identify him?’ Benedict asked heavily.

  ‘I know of no one else who can,’ said James, ‘and no one else who should. I shall go to Furnival Tower House and tell them what I have done. And Ben—’

  Benedict waited for him to go on.

  ‘Ben,’ repeated James, ‘such a story should go to the other newspapers, too.’

  ‘On that we are agreed,’ Benedict acknowledged reluctantly. ‘No newspaper is keeping information of great significance to itself. It will be in all the papers, Jamey, with a likeness of Lord George Gordon alongside your brother’s. And it will come in the same edition as Lord George Gordon’s arrest and committal to the Tower on a charge of treason.’ He gripped James’s shoulder. ‘I do not like your task, Jamey, but you have no choice.’

  ‘I am in full agreement,’ William Furnival said. ‘You have no choice, James.’

  ‘None whatsoever,’ Francis agreed.

  ‘But you must give thought to one aspect of it,’ William went on very quietly. ‘It will cause your mother great hurt, even though she may agree on the need.’

  ‘Yes,’ James said slowly. ‘Yes, I know. And you are both very good.’

  ‘You are exhausted,’ Francis observed. ‘Will you not rest for a few hours, Jamey?’

  ‘I wish I could,’ James replied, ‘and I am grateful. But I must take my seat in the House this afternoon. There is an early session. Then I must go to Chelsea. I have not been home since the first night of the riots. No, no, there is nothing to fear,’ he went on hastily. ‘The house has been well guarded and I have been able to send Mary a message every day.’

  ‘At least you will let us take you to Westminster by the river,’ insisted Francis.

  Both the older men walked with James to the steps he had descended with Timothy on the night the new docks were opened. Both watched as he rowed away, and he waited until they were out of sight before looking about him. On the river itself, crowded as ever, there was no sign of the rioting, but along the north bank he could see great palls of smoke, while everywhere great smuts from the fires lay like black snow, as if the city had been sent into mourning.

  The boat was to wait for him.

  He walked to the Palace of Westminster and took his place among the other Members. Never had he seen the House so silent and so grim. Men who had never acknowledged him before spoke with courtesy, and some made their way towards him saying, ‘Such a thing must not happen again, Marshall. Now we can see why you have fought so bitterly for a peacekeeping force.’

  But although at least a dozen said as much, a hundred growled their protest at the shooting of ‘innocent civilians’ by the troops without a magistrate’s order. They blamed the magistrates, the government, the high constables, the troops, but never themselves for leaving the nation’s capital open to such violence.

  When James tried to say so, they shouted him down.

  In the House of Lords at this same time, another man, Lord Shelburne, fought against the tide of popular opinion.

  ‘The peace-keeping in Westminster is an imperfect, inadequate and wretched system,’ he declared. ‘It ought to be entirely new-modelled and this immediately. Recollect what the peace-keeping by the police of France is like. Examine its good but do not be blind to its evil.’

  The Lords turned on Shelburne.

  ‘It is all evil. . . There is no good in the French police. . . Englishmen must be free. . .’

  While the bodies of seven hundred dead were collected from the streets and rain washed away the reek of blood, Sir John Fielding lay near death, mercifully unknowing that both Houses at Westminster were as bitterly opposed as ever to his great dream.

  The river lapped against the jetty in sight of The House by the River, and the boatman handed him out and thanked him gravely for his shilling tip. Slowly James walked along the path towards his home, seeing two or three of the children in the orchard with one of the maids. At least six men stood in various places nearby: Simon Rattray’s men, thought James, sent as protection against any marauding party from the rioters. Had Rattray’s warning been heeded, the riots would never have got under way. As it was, and despite the initial reaction of the politicians, this might be the beginning of a new era, of a different attitude towards the problem of maintaining law and order.

  James wondered idly why Rattray’s men had not gone home; did they believe that danger remained?

  He walked around to the side of the house and saw a single-horse tied there but did not recognise it. Turning the key in the heavy side door, he pushed it open, exasperated because they had a visitor at a time when he had so wanted to be alone with Mary. Then alarm shot through him at the thought that this might be a messenger from St. Giles: such a messenger would only come with bad news. He heard Mary speaking, heard her finish.

  ‘I tell you I have no idea when he will return. He has not been here for a week.’

  ‘Then he is not likely to be long,’ a man replied. ‘I shall wait, sister.’

  Only one man in the world would call Mary ‘sister’ in that half-jeering way; and there was only one voice like that in the world.

  Johnny’s.

  On the instant that he recognised Johnny’s voice, James wondered: Are the men outside Simon’s or Johnny’s? There was no way of being sure, no way of knowing why Johnny was here. Closing the door, James glanced over his shoulder, sensing rather than hearing a presence, and felt a stab of fear as he saw a tall, heavily built man coming from the front room, head bent so that he could get under the lintel.

  This was the giant who had been at his ‘hanging’.

  The man called out, ‘He’s here, Mr. Furnival.’

  James heard Mary’s sharp intake of breath, then a chair scraping on the boards, and a moment later Johnny called -out in deep tones of satisfaction, ‘So he’s arrived at last. Come in, half brother. Come in.’

  Heart thumping, James pushed open the door.

  Johnny still sat in the chair but it was turned towards the door.

  He had never seemed so massive. He wore a flowered waistcoat worked in gold thread, a long jacket of dark-brown velvet, knee breeches and stockings to match; it was hard to believe this could have been the ragged, unkempt creature who had fanned the crowds to such violence. His face was wreathed in smiles but there was no humour in his eyes. Mary was standing by the tall fireplace, and there was fear in her.

  ‘Don’t drag your feet now. Come in, I tell you,’ Johnny said.

  On the table by his elbow was a pistol, and beneath his outward relaxation was the strong suggestion of a lion about to pounce on its prey.

  James walked on, the giant remaining in the doorway. He looked steadily at the younger man.

  ‘This is the last place you should have come, Johnny.’

  ‘Others would say it was the first, half brother. Come in, Jamey, don’t stand close to the door; Big Will might get you this time. I was just telling Mary of the occasion when you nearly
got hanged, drawn and quartered. I should have let Rackham have his way with you. There’s another thing, Jamey.’ Johnny placed his hands lightly on the arms of his chair and leaned his head back, cold light in his eyes negating the bright smile on his lips. ‘I was always fonder of you than any man or woman of my family. Why - I was going to bring my love to you and ask you and Mary to look after her while I was away, for I knew the metropolis would be too hot for me for a while. She is with child, Jamey! I am not a sterile creature after all. Isabella is to bear my child. And I wanted her with someone I could trust. In all innocence I was coming here when I was given a copy of The Daily Clarion. Have you seen a copy, half brother?’

  ‘I know what is in it,’ James Marshall replied.

  ‘Do you think that was a grateful thing to do?’ Now Johnny stood up very slowly. He moved first to the table and picked up the pistol, then towards James. His lips were stretched taut across his teeth; no one could be deceived by his smile now. Taking a folded newspaper from his pocket, he spread it out so that James could see both the picture and story. ‘Or would you call that betrayal, Jamey?’

  ‘The only betrayal is yours,’ James returned heavily.

  ‘What did I hear you say?’

  ‘You have betrayed your father, your mother, your family, all—’

  James broke off at the sudden change of expression on Johnny’s face, at the hatred in his gaze, and on the instant Johnny flung newspaper and pistol aside and leaped at James with both arms outstretched. James clutched at Johnny’s wrists but already iron fingers were tightening about his throat and the breath was being choked out of him.

  There seemed no hope of life.

  Then through the mists of his mind, another voice sounded. Hands descended on Johnny Furnival, pulling him off. James, dimly seeing Johnny swing around, suddenly realised that his half brother was face to face with Simon Rattray and that they were only a yard apart, whilst Big Will lay on the floor, blood running from a wound in his forehead.

  Simon let Johnny go, and each drew farther from the other, but neither turned away, and neither uttered a word until Johnny said thinly, ‘Another of his bastards.’ Both men were breathing heavily, their lips and jaws set; it was as if each were looking at a reflection of himself in a mirror which stood between them.

  Suddenly Johnny leaped.

  He could have snatched at his gun. He could have seized a knife. Instead he flung himself bodily at Simon, who was ready to resist the onslaught and did no more than stand. For a few terrible moments there was a flailing of arms as Johnny groped for Simon’s throat and Simon fended him off. Then, as suddenly as Johnny had leaped, Simon moved, thrusting both arms around the other in a mighty hug which brought a gasp from Johnny’s lips and made his hands relax. With another swift movement Johnny tried to counter the pressure by driving his knee into Simon’s groin but had no room in which to move. Simon did not ease the pressure but tightened it until Johnny began to gasp with pain and sweat gathered at his forehead and rolled down his cheeks.

  Simon freed him, took one arm, then pulled him around so that instead of being face to face the one was behind the other. Johnny backheeled but there was no power in his kick, and the next moment Simon’s right arm was across Johnny’s neck, bending the head back - and farther back - and farther back still.

  The crack of the breaking neck sounded throughout the room.

  Mary uttered a groaning sound, went limp, and would have fallen but for James’s support.

  Slowly, slowly, Johnny’s body crumpled, and Simon stood back and let him fall. Simon’s chest was heaving, veins were swollen in his neck and forehead, and he stood without moving for what seemed a long time.

  At last he turned to James, who had lowered Mary to a chair. There was a strange light in his eyes as he said hoarsely, ‘It was he or I. There was no other way.’ He moved towards the table and leaned on it with both hands, the colour gone from his face and the strength drawn from him as he looked up at James from beneath his brows and spoke with a great effort. ‘It is better - this way. The other way he would have gone - to some prison. He would have been tried and found guilty. He would have been hanged - perhaps worse than hanged. It is - much better this way.’

  James said, ‘I think that also.’

  ‘There is a - Furnival boat still at the landing stage. Shall he be sent to Furnival Tower House?’

  ‘I know of no better place,’ James said. ‘No better place at all.’

  So many died in the riots that no one inquired into the manner of Johnny’s death. He was buried in a City churchyard, and only James and his mother grieved.

  Slowly the city recovered from the riots and the dead were buried; work had already started on rebuilding the houses and the prisons which had been burned down. Slowly the House of Commons returned to normal, its resistance to any creation of a peace force becoming, obtusely, even stronger. To James, the greatest tragedy of all was that Sir John Fielding was now too weak to take part in any new efforts to break down this resistance.

  On that day in September when Sir John was buried with only a few to watch and mourn, James rode with Benedict Sly and Nicholas from the cemetery to the Clarion offices, where he first read the obituary, then a leading article in which Benedict had asked:

  Who will be next to lead Bow Street?

  Who will be next to work for the great ideals of this man who killed himself in the service of his fellow citizens and the city he loved? Let the government make the appointment of chief magistrate with great care, and let the people scrutinise Sir John Fielding’s successor in the knowledge that their own future will be involved with it.

  This great city will never be freed from the criminals who feed like vultures upon it until there is in being an incorruptible peacemaking force paid by the State and dedicated, as were the Fielding brothers and Sir John Furnival before them, to the war against crime.

  James put the newspaper down and said slowly, ‘If Fielding could have read that he would have been a happy man.’

  Once again Benedict put a hand on his shoulder.

  ‘There are other factors which would have made him happy, and should help to make you much happier, Jamey,’ he said quietly. ‘I have a report from a secret source at Westminster which says that the government is, after all, to use Bow Street as the first experiment in creating the force we need. They will pay for a foot patrol, and if it is successful in keeping law and order and reducing crime in the streets, they will extend it. There is opposition but little doubt that the plans will be approved. Do not be surprised if you are consulted, nor hurt if they neglect you. Politicians are notorious for their ingratitude.’

  ‘If they will do this, they can forget that I ever existed!’ James cried.

  29: THE LAST TYBURN HANGING

  ‘You understand that there will be strict limitations on what we are prepared to do,’ Lord North said to James the following week, ‘but the government feels that your knowledge of Bow Street and its - ah - unofficial methods in the past is so extensive that you can be of great assistance.’

  ‘You are most kind,’ James replied.

  ‘The government is not unmindful of your endeavours even if at times it has regarded you as being - ahem - considerably ahead of your time. There is one other matter. It is the desire of the Sheriffs of London to put an end to public hanging and the subsequent rejoicing thereafter. Knowing of your deep convictions on the subject. . .’

  This was a task James could work on with good heart.

  Then he found in Sheridan, the playwright, an enthusiast for a new and co-ordinated force, heard him propose in the House of Commons that in the case of civil riot the Army should be available to intervene without the order of a civil magistrate.

  ‘I am opposed to any alteration of our system of peacekeeping,’ the Solicitor General said in reply. ‘The Gordon Riots were a single instance of a defect in a civil power which in all probability will never occur again.’

  And the proposal was over
whelmingly defeated.

  On the morning of July I, 1783, more than two years later, James woke to sunshine streaming in at the window and to the noises of the children in the garden. Turning on his side, he saw Mary moving quietly across the room so as not to disturb him, and he called out. She came towards him, smiling, startlingly like the Mary he had seen that night when he had called on the Reverend Sebastian Smith.

  She sat on the side of the bed, her hands in his, laughter lurking in her eyes as she said, ‘This is not a day for you to be late, Mr. Marshall.’

  ‘What is there to make me hurry?’ he demanded.

  ‘I do not believe that you have forgotten. This is the day of the last Tyburn Fair. Shame on you that you would dally on such a solemn occasion. I have been reading an article by our friend Benedict,’ she went on. ‘He is wryly amused by the great reform sponsored by the Sheriffs of London, Sir Barnard Turner and Thomas Skinner. What genius they have to put an end to the hangings in Tyburn and to have them instead outside the gates of Newgate Palace! And such solemn occasions hangings shall be, with the gallows to be draped in black and only a man of God to stand beside the condemned men and the hangman. Also, there is to be a drop, the floor-giving way beneath them so that death is quick.’ She tightened her grip on James’s hands and asked, ‘Do you think it will be an improvement, Jamey?’

  After a pause he answered, ‘I think it will be a step forward, not a step back. I had not forgotten the day, my love.’

  ‘Did you desire to drown the memory in me, Mr. Marshall?’

  ‘I think I wanted to be here with you when the accursed cart is moving,’ he said, ‘but—’ He broke off, half frowning as he looked at her.

  ‘Nay,’ she said. ‘For whenever we were together in bed we’d have the gallows for company. If you are not at Tyburn to watch the last hanging you will regret it, husband. You would be drawn there, whatever I say.’ She drew herself free and stood up, asking gently, ‘Would you have me with you, James?’