by Emily Organ
Bermondsey was a lively, busy place, where rows of cramped little houses sat cheek by jowl with factories pumping out fumes of chocolate, glue and sulphur. Every spare corner was given over to industry of one sort or another. Machines rumbled and hammers pounded. As I neared Bermondsey Square the acrid odour from the large tanneries caught in the back of my throat.
The inquest into John Curran’s death was held in an upstairs room at The Five Bells public house.
The coroner, Mr Robert Osborne, was a wispy-haired man with a thick moustache, and he sat at a table with a small group of gentlemen. The jury of twelve men sat on chairs along one side of the room, while the press reporters and members of the public were crammed into what remained of the floor space. I did my best to write everything down in my notebook, squashed as I was between two other reporters.
The coroner stated that John Curran had been a labourer at a local tannery and was thirty-one years old when he died at his home, 96 Grange Walk, on the seventeenth of August. Proceedings were halted for a short while at this point as the jury paid a visit to the mortuary in the nearby church to view the body.
Once the jury had returned, Mr Osborne called on the first witness, Dr Jacob Hill, who stated that Mr Curran had been unwell for about a week before his death. Mr Curran’s wife, Catherine, had on two occasions summoned the doctor to the home they had shared while he was unwell.
“Can you describe the symptoms Mr Curran presented with, Dr Hill?” asked the coroner.
“He complained of pain in his bowels and diarrhoea.”
“And what treatment did you recommend?”
“I ordered for him to take soda water and milk.”
Dr Hill reported that there had been no improvement in Mr Curran’s condition by the time of his second visit and stated that he had found Catherine to be an extremely concerned and attentive nurse. He had last seen her when she visited him at his surgery to request a certificate of death.
A man representing Prudential Life Insurance Limited deposed that Mr Curran had been insured with the company for the sum of fifty pounds, and a representative from the General Assurance Society confirmed that Catherine Curran had effected a policy on her husband’s life for the sum of thirty pounds. Both policies had been taken out with Mr Curran’s full consent.
Mr Osborne then called for William Curran, the brother of John. A young, clean-shaven man with a heavy brow and scruffy fair hair walked up to the table. He held a cap in his hand and wore a smart but ill-fitting suit, which I guessed he had borrowed for the occasion.
William Curran stated that he lived in Paulin Street and worked at the same tannery where his brother had been employed.
“Were you concerned about your brother before he died?” asked the coroner.
“Yes, sir, I was, ’cause ’e’d taken to ’is sickbed.”
“And what was his sickness?”
“What the doctor ’ere said. Diarrhoea. An’ vomitin’ an’ pains such as ’e’d never ’ad afore.”
“And prior to this spell of sickness, would you say that your brother had been in good health?”
“Yes, sir. Never ’ad a day of sickness ’is entire life.”
“He was ordinarily a fit and healthy man?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And did you have any idea as to the cause of his sickness?”
“Not ter start wiv. I thought ’e’d get better, but it was when she stopped me seein’ ’im, that’s when I begun ter get suspicious.”
“Can you explain who you mean by she?”
“Yeah, ’is wife, Caffrine.”
“Mrs Catherine Curran prevented you from visiting your sick brother?”
“Yeah. I’ve seen ’im once, and when I’ve went back to see if ’e was gettin’ better she ain’t never let me back in.”
“Mrs Curran would not readmit you to their home?”
“Nope.”
“Did she give you a reason for refusing to do so?”
“She tells me as ’e’s tired and don’t want no visitors. Well, that don’t sound like our John! I ain’t never known ’im refuse ter see me.”
“Did you attempt to visit your brother again after that?”
“Yeah, twice more I tried ter see ’im.”
“And you were unsuccessful?”
“She weren’t lettin’ me in the door.”
“In your statement to the police you say that you visited your brother on the twelfth of August, and that was the last time you saw him. Is that correct?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And why did you inform the police about your brother’s death?”
“’Cause she wouldn’t let me see ’im, like I said! I told ’em she’s done summink to ’im. I dunno what, but she’s done summink. It weren’t right.”
“What made you think Mrs Curran had done something, as you put it, to your brother?”
“‘It just weren’t normal. I smelt a rat.”
Detective Inspector Charles Martin of M Division was the next witness. He was a young, fair-haired man with a round, pleasant face and fair whiskers.
“I was informed that Mr William Curran had concerns that his sister-in-law might have had a hand in his brother’s death,” he told Mr Osborne.
“And what caused you to give credence to his accusation?” asked the coroner.
“I wasn’t sure whether to believe it or not initially, sir. It’s not uncommon for the police to receive false accusations pertaining to all sorts of crimes, including murder. However, it is my duty to establish whether there is any basis for the accusation.”
“And did you find any such basis?”
“My suspicions were aroused, sir, when I went to the address, number 96 Grange Walk, and found no sign of Mrs Curran there. The enquiries I made with her neighbours suggested that she had taken off.”
“Have you since established the woman’s whereabouts?”
“No, sir. M Division is currently carrying out an extensive search for the woman.”
“Can you speculate on the reason for Mrs Curran’s disappearance?”
“One possible explanation is that she is guilty of her husband’s murder, as Mr William Curran has suggested. The sudden death of a usually healthy man, the disappearance of his wife, and the existence of not just one but two life insurance policies, led us to decide that a post-mortem examination of Mr Curran’s body was necessary. And the findings of the autopsy suggest that—”
“Thank you, Inspector Martin. I shall stop you there as we will hear about the autopsy from the police surgeon next.”
Dr Montague Grant had a long ginger beard and wore half-moon spectacles. He confirmed that he had carried out the post-mortem examination and explained that the stomach and bowels had shown signs of inflammation and ulceration, which suggested Mr Curran had consumed an irritant.
“And you suspected this irritant to be a poison?” asked the coroner.
“Yes indeed, sir, so I removed sections of the viscera and sealed them into three jars, which were then passed to Mr Irving at the Royal Institution.”
The analytical chemist from the Royal Institution, Mr Joseph Irving, spoke next.
“I examined the contents of each jar according to Reinsch’s test and obtained evidence of arsenic being present,” he said. “I also conducted an examination according to Marsh’s test, which provided the same result. An extraction of the poison from the viscera was then conducted by the Fresenius-von Babo method, which yielded a quantity of arsenic equivalent to one-and-a-third grains from the stomach and intestines. A further quantity of arsenic, equal to one grain, was obtained from the liver, kidneys and spleen. I should add that the intestines had a golden-yellow appearance, which suggests that arsenic was present throughout, and that this was not a case of a single incident of poisoning.”
“You believe that more than one dose was administered to the deceased?”
“I do, yes.”
“And that the amount of arsenic present was enough to kill a
man?”
“Yes.”
Once all the witnesses had spoken, Mr Osborne addressed the jury: “My judgement on the matter is that we must adjourn for two weeks in order to allow the police time to search the home of the deceased for further evidence of arsenic poisoning, and to locate the whereabouts of Mrs Catherine Curran. I propose that this inquest be resumed on Wednesday the third of September.”
Chapter 4
“So in summary, Inspector, you believe that Mrs Curran poisoned her husband and then ran off with the life insurance money,” I said to Inspector Martin as we stood outside the pub in Bermondsey Square after the inquest.
“It seems that way, although there could be another explanation.”
“Such as?”
“I don’t know yet, but I’m reluctant to jump to immediate conclusions. Morning Express did you say?”
I nodded.
“My father takes the Morning Express. I try to read it when I find the time; you never know what snippets of intelligence may be picked up from the reading of a newspaper.”
“Some claim that newspapers contain no intelligence at all,” I commented.
Inspector Martin laughed. “We all know those types, don’t we? The grumbling sort of chap who perpetually complains that his glass is half full.”
“I hope you find Mrs Curran very soon,” I said. “She has a lot of questions to answer.”
“She certainly does. Have you seen that photograph of her?”
“No, which one would that be?”
Inspector Martin opened the folder he had been holding under his arm and pulled out a piece of card, which was about five by eight inches in size.
“I’ve shown it to a few of the press chaps,” he continued. “It’s a photograph of her with Mr Curran. A local photographer contacted me shortly after Mrs Curran went missing. He’d heard that she had run off, and it seems she was so quick to get away that she never visited his studio to pick this up.”
He handed me the photograph, which showed a couple sitting side by side on a small settee. The woman looked about thirty and was fair-haired and dark-eyed with a pretty, heart-shaped face. She wore mourning dress with black gloves and a black bonnet. The man sitting beside her wore a buttoned-up jacket, a starched collar, a dark tie and a peaked cap. The expression on his face was oddly fixed, and whereas the woman was looking directly at the camera there was something about the man’s eyes which didn’t seem quite right.
Inspector Martin must have noticed my quizzical expression. “The photographer has painted the eyes onto the photograph,” he explained. “Mr Curran was deceased by the time this was taken.”
I stared down at the couple incredulously. “I can understand why someone might wish to have a photographic memory of their loved one,” I said. “But arranging for the photo to be taken when you have just murdered him? That seems highly unlikely.”
“If it’s true, it would certainly be a macabre thing to do, Miss Green,” he replied. “This photograph was taken on the day Mr Curran died. After collecting the certificate of death from the doctor, Mrs Curran requested that the photographer visit her home and take this photograph in one of the rooms they occupied in the upper storey of the house. By the following day she was gone. We were admitted to the house by the lady who lives downstairs, and when we gained access to the upstairs room we found poor Mr Curran sitting in the same position he had been arranged in for the photograph.”
“Good grief!” I shivered.
“That’s when we realised something was amiss and had him removed to the mortuary. We have since discovered that Mrs Curran was successful in swiftly obtaining from the insurance companies the amount of money she effected on the life of her husband.”
“It’s difficult to believe that someone could be so cold and calculating,” I said with a sigh. “Catherine Curran looks like an ordinary woman in this photograph. She even looks as though she might be friendly. I simply cannot see how she might be capable of something like this.”
“We can’t be certain that she is, but it’s all rather suspicious, isn’t it? We haven’t found many people who know her well yet, but from what we hear she’s a friendly lady who was apparently very concerned about her husband’s illness and nursed him up to his final moments.”
“Presumably to feed him as much arsenic as possible.”
“Possibly. And if that’s what happened the poor fellow probably never realised she was the cause of his ailment.”
“How dreadful,” I said, taking one last look at the photograph before handing it back to the inspector. “Could he really have had no suspicion that he was being poisoned?”
“By all accounts arsenic has no flavour, so it’s impossible to taste the poison in a mouthful of food or drink.”
“Have you any idea where she obtained the poison?”
“Not yet. Its sale is carefully controlled, as you probably know. But we are still collecting items from the home and the analytical chemist will test them for the presence of arsenic. We’re also making enquiries at the local stores to find out whether any of them sold vermin powder to her.”
“And you have no clues at all as to her whereabouts? Have you visited her family and friends?”
“We have only been able to locate a few acquaintances so far. William Curran recalls her telling him that she had some family in Kent.”
“Do you know much about her?”
“Not much at all, but hopefully we shall learn a lot more presently.”
“The money from the life insurance has presumably facilitated her escape.”
“No doubt it has. It means she can afford both board and travel. My fear is that she’s taken a train somewhere and left London altogether.”
I sighed. “I suppose she could be anywhere.”
“We mustn’t lose hope, Miss Green. We’ll do whatever we can to find her. You could help us by publishing an appeal for her whereabouts in the Morning Express. The general public can be very helpful at times such as these. Someone must know where she is.”
Chapter 5
I returned to The Five Bells after my conversation with Inspector Martin. As I had hoped, William Curran was already drinking inside. He had removed his tie, which was lying on the bar next to his mug of beer.
“Yer don’t see many women writin’ for the papers,” he said after I had introduced myself. Dark eyes observed me from beneath his heavy brow.
“Not yet,” I replied. “I hope there will be more in due course. Please accept my condolences for the sad passing of your brother, Mr Curran.”
“That’s kind o’ yer, Miss Green. Still can’t believe he ain’t ’ere no more. People will tell yer that we didn’t always see eye to eye but ’e’s still me brother.”
William Curran seemed reasonably polite, but his movements were heavy and there was something unpleasant about his gaze that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. He struck me as the type of man who possessed a violent nature.
“I pray that your sister-in-law is found soon. If it’s proven that Catherine poisoned him she will need to face justice.”
“It’s obvious it’s ’er, ain’t it?”
“It does seem that way.”
“They reckons it’s arsenic, don’t they? Who else would’ve given ’im arsenic? And with the life insurance an’ ev’rythin’. All she wanted was the money! She should swing fer it.”
He wrapped a large hand around his mug of beer and lifted it to his lips.
“What’s she like?” I asked.
“I used ter fink as she was a good ’un! Thought she loved ’im, I did.”
“How long were they married for?”
“Near on a year.”
“Do you know where they met?”
“Down The Butcher’s Arms on Long Lane.”
“And did they know each other for long before they were married?”
“Can’t recall now. Few months, proberly.”
“So they first met early last year?”
Wi
lliam took another sip of his beer while he considered this. “S’pose it would be, yeah.”
“Your brother was about twenty-nine or thirty by then. Had he been married before that?”
“No, it were the first time fer John.”
“And Catherine was presumably of a similar age?”
“I dunno really. I s’pose she is. She ain’t much younger than ’im.”
“Did you know anything of her life before they met? Perhaps she had been married before.”
“I fink ’e said as she was, but I can’t be certain of it.”
“Did she talk much about herself?”
“Not much, no.”
“Any family members? Parents? Siblings?”
“Never met any of ’em.”
“You didn’t meet anyone from her family at the wedding?”
“Not as I can recall. Weren’t many of us there.”
“Catherine Curran strikes me as rather a mysterious lady.”
“I can’t say as I knows ’er too well. She’s kind and everyfink, always asks ’ow you are an’ that. She’s quiet-spoken and John got no answerin’ back from ’er. I remember finking as she was a good ’un, but I don’t fink it no more!”
“You mention that you didn’t always see eye to eye with your brother. Had you fallen out at the time of his death?”
“Not as such. I jus’ wanted ter see ’im and make fings right. When I ’eard ’e was took bad I wanted to tell ’im I was sorry.”
“What for?”
“There ain’t no need ter go into all that now.” His dark, stony stare prompted me to change the subject.
“Are you married, Mr Curran?”
“Yeah, my missus is called Ellen.”
“Does Ellen know Catherine well?”