by Emily Organ
Eliza’s face brightened a little. “For a woman who has never married, Penelope, you can be very wise about these things.”
“There is no need to be married to understand love, Ellie.”
“Perhaps not. Your rather complicated affection for Inspector Blakely has taught you that, no doubt.”
“There is nothing complicated about my affection for him,” I replied.
“But he is to marry someone else!”
“Yes,” I sighed, “and I wish that had changed how I feel about him, but unfortunately it has made no difference at all.”
“It can’t be long now,” ventured Eliza.
“Two weeks today,” I replied curtly. “Though I prefer not to dwell on it.”
“You cannot pretend that it isn’t happening.”
“I’m not! But there is nothing I can do about it.”
“You could try to change his mind.”
“And how would I go about that? He knows how I feel about him, yet he persists in this marriage with Charlotte. I can only imagine that he cares for her more than he cares for me. Why else would he allow the wedding to go ahead?”
“Perhaps he does,” said Eliza, “but perhaps he doesn’t. I think you should remind him of your affection for him one last time.”
“He won’t change his mind, regardless of what I say.”
“He just might.”
“Weren’t we just talking about the sanctity of marriage?”
“Yes, we were. And I think it is incredibly important to marry the right person. There is nothing worse than realising you’ve made a mistake once it is already too late.”
Chapter 21
“The chemist at the Royal Institution has graciously worked through the weekend and completed his tests on the remains of Thomas Burrell and Francis Peel,” said Sergeant Richards. “He has concluded that they were both poisoned with large quantities of arsenic.”
“As we suspected,” said James.
He and I stood with the sergeant in the parade room at Bermondsey police station. Today was Monday the first of September, and only twelve days remained until James’ wedding. I tried not to dwell on this dispiriting fact and instead concentrated on what Sergeant Richards was telling us.
“The chemist has also examined the bottles and fly papers we removed from Miss Chadwick’s home,” continued the sergeant, “and he found a quantity of arsenic in the solution inside the bottles. Each fly paper has been confirmed to contain a grain of arsenic in soluble form.”
“Then the chemist’s findings support everything Miss Chadwick has told us!” said James.
“I still cannot believe that she did it,” I said.
“It’s rather difficult to argue with the evidence,” said James. “And she has also confessed to it all. It makes our work much easier when we have a confession.”
“But something isn’t quite right about it,” I said. “I don’t think the case is as simple as it seems.”
“You’re right, Penny,” said James. “Catherine Curran is still evading us, and we have a good few questions to ask her.”
“Where is Inspector Martin?” I asked.
“Unfortunately, he has been taken ill,” replied Sergeant Richards. “Hopefully he’ll be fully recovered and back with us soon.”
“Let’s hope so,” said James. “We’ve a lot to do.” He removed his notebook from his pocket and looked something up in it.
I watched him and thought about my conversation with Eliza at the weekend. Might it really be worth my while trying to remind him of my affection for him? Was there any chance that he would cancel his wedding if he knew how I truly felt? I thought I had already made my feelings clear, but perhaps I hadn’t spoken directly enough.
“I’ll have another conversation with Miss Chadwick shortly,” said Sergeant Richards. “She’ll be brought up in front of the magistrates on Wednesday.”
“Does she have a solicitor?” I asked.
“She told Inspector Martin she didn’t want one.”
“Oh dear. She needs one!” I said. “She can’t represent herself. I don’t think she will be able to understand anything that is happening inside the courtroom.”
“I don’t think she really understands what a solicitor is,” said the sergeant.
“James,” I pleaded, “can we do something about this?”
“She has been asked if she would like a solicitor and she refused,” he said. “We cannot simply force one upon her.”
I sighed. “There must be someone who knows her who could give her some advice,” I said. “She can’t cope with this ordeal all by herself. Did anyone visit her over the weekend?”
Sergeant Richards shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
“Can I see her?” I asked.
“Why?”
“Because I feel sorry for her. She’s shut up in a cell and has had no visitors to speak of.”
“She has confessed to multiple murders, Miss Green.”
“I realise that. But does she really know what she’s caught up in, or what the consequences might be? I don’t believe she does.”
“Penny, I understand why you feel some sympathy toward Miss Chadwick,” said James, “but you’re a news reporter. The well-being of a prisoner is not something you need worry yourself about.”
“But I do worry,” I retorted. “She approached me in the street and confessed to me. It was my idea to bring her here, and now I feel partly responsible for her unfortunate predicament.”
“You’re not responsible for it at all, Penny! She has murdered three men, and with all the bottles of arsenic-laced water we found in her home I’m amazed she hasn’t poisoned herself in the meantime! Your work has been of huge value to us, but her predicament is entirely of her own making. Please don’t feel any responsibility for her.”
“Someone needs to.”
“But not you.”
“Can I see her for just a few moments?” I asked. “It may help her a little to see a friendly face. A female face.”
James gave an exasperated laugh. “I know that you won’t give up on this idea until we agree, so yes, I don’t see what harm it could do. I’m assuming that Sergeant Richards will accompany you.”
The sergeant nodded and indicated for me to follow him down the stone steps to the gaoler’s office. The gaoler was a hatchet-faced man of few words. He led us along a damp, brick corridor to the three cells reserved for female prisoners. Croaky strains of ‘Champagne Charlie’ were blaring out of one of them.
“Shaddap!” yelled the gaoler, thumping the door of the cell.
A torrent of curse words was hurled at him in response.
The gaoler opened the door of the next cell, where Sally sat on a thin mattress atop a small wooden bedstead. She wore the same scruffy dress and apron she had been wearing the last time I saw her. Her dirty, straw-coloured hair was even more unkempt.
“Good morning, Miss Chadwick,” said Sergeant Richards. "I’ve brought Miss Penny Green with me this time. Do you remember her?”
She gave me a broad, lopsided smile.
“How are you, Sally?” I asked, stepping into the cell. The air was stale and smelled of unwashed bodies.
She nodded and smiled again.
“You’re to appear in court in two days’ time,” I said. “You should agree to have a solicitor go with you.”
“Don’t want one,” she replied cheerfully.
“But the solicitor will explain to you what’s happening and will help you answer any questions the magistrates might want to ask you.”
Sally shrugged nonchalantly and began to hum a quiet tune.
I glanced at Sergeant Richards, who gave me a look that suggested I should give up all attempts to reason with her.
The woman in the neighbouring cell began to sing again.
“Are you happy here, Sally?” I asked.
She stopped humming and looked up at me. “Yes!” She grinned.
“Did Catherine Curran tell you to po
ison those three men?” I asked.
Sally’s face fell at the mention of Catherine’s name.
“Miss Green, I must ask you to leave,” said Sergeant Richards sternly. “That’s the sort of question that must be left to the police.”
I took a step back. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have asked that,” I said. “It was foolish of me.”
“Please step out of the cell now, Miss Green,” said the sergeant firmly.
“I will visit you again soon, Sally,” I said with a smile in a desperate attempt to cheer her up again.
She gave me a faint smile in return.
“Not if you’re going to ask her questions like that one, you won’t,” said Sergeant Richards.
“I won’t, I promise,” I replied as I left the cell. “It’s just that I’m sure she must know—”
“We’ll get it out of her before long,” he said, nodding to the gaoler, who closed and locked the door. “You do your job, Miss Green, and leave us to do ours.”
Chapter 22
As I climbed the steps up to the police station I felt angry with myself for asking Sally Chadwick about Catherine Curran. I had spoken without giving my actions proper thought, and I knew it was borne out of the frustration of being certain that Catherine must have had something to do with her husbands’ deaths. Sally was the only person who could confirm this for us. However, I knew this was no excuse for taking matters into my own hands.
We found James in the waiting room talking to a tall, thin man with red hair and whiskers. He wore a rough woollen suit and held his cap in one hand.
“You believe that someone poisoned you, do you?” James asked the man.
“Aye, but I lived ter tell the tale. That’s why I’m ’ere!” He grinned.
“This is Mr Benjamin Taylor,” James told me and Sergeant Richards. He introduced us to the man, who gave us a genial nod.
“And who do you believe it was that tried to poison you?” James asked him.
“I reckon it were the missis what done it.” His brown eyes were wide and earnest-looking.
“Your wife?”
“Aye.”
“Why would you think that?”
“Whenever I was at ’ome I was tooken ill, and whenever I went away I got better again. I remember jokin’ wiv ’er that it were being at ’ome what made me ill.”
“Did you stay away from home regularly, Mr Taylor?” asked James.
“Yeah, I was doin’ buildin’ work, and when it were far away I stayed elsewhere. Sometimes fer a few weeks or more. I don’t do it no more. I work at Doulton’s now.”
“The pottery?” asked James.
“That’s the one. Like I say, I was workin’ away and whenever I went ’ome I got ill again. I joked that it were summink in the water. Then a friend o’ mine said as I was bein’ poisoned, and ’e was jokin’ an’ all, but I got ter thinkin’ ’bout it ’cause I knowed she took out the insurance. We ’ad no money for insurance, but she was quick ter do it anyways, and when I asked ’er did she want me dead she jus’ laughed. Then when I asked ’er was she poisonin’ me, she didn’t take kindly to it. I only said it as a joke, like, but she took it bad and was shoutin’ at me ’bout what sort of wife did I think she was.”
“How long ago was this?” asked James.
“We was married in ’75 and I ain’t seen ’er since ’78. We’re still married, but I ain’t seen ’er this last six years.”
“And what was your wife’s name?”
“Jane Vincent.”
James and I exchanged a glance.
“And you have no idea what became of her?” asked Sergeant Richards.
“Not an inklin’.”
“Did you know her family?”
“They lived in Kent’s what she told me. I met ’em once or twice, but I couldn’t tell yer where they lives now. Wouldn’t recognise ’em if I fell over ’em these days.”
“And how do you think your wife was attempting to poison you?” asked James.
“Puttin’ it in me food, I reckon. And I got sick; so sick I couldn’t work no more, and then no money was comin’ in. So she got a job down the leather market.”
“Which one?”
“Lambeth.”
“Can you describe your wife for me?”
“Yellow ’air, small. Brown eyes. Pretty, she were. That’s what drew me to ’er in the first place.”
“And how old was she when you were married?”
“’Bout twenny.”
“You married nine years ago, which means she would be round twenty-nine years old now. Is that right?”
“Dunno. Summat like that.”
“And you say that you joked about her poisoning you and that she didn’t find it funny?” asked James.
“She didn’t. She took it bad.”
“Do you think she continued to poison you after that?”
“Aye, and that was the worst one! Nearly died, I did! Doctor told me I was lucky ter survive it. Couldn’t stop with it, all the vomitin’ an’ that. She was nursin’ me, but I told ’er I wanted ’er away from me. I told ’er she were a witch. She didn’t like that, and I told ’er ter get outta the ’ouse else I’d kick ’er out. So she went back down ter Kent and I ain’t never seen ’er again.”
“Did you report your suspicions to the police?”
“I never did, ’cause I weren’t sure of it meself. I thought it must of been ’er makin’ me sick, but I couldn’t prove nothin’. The police wouldn’t of believed me.”
“And this was when, exactly?”
“It were in ’78.”
“You lived in Lambeth together, you say?”
“That we did.”
“Do you spend much time in Bermondsey as a general rule?”
“Not likely. I just come ’ere ’cause I ’eard about these ’ere poisonin’s.”
“Does the name Sally Chadwick mean anything to you?”
“No, it don’t.”
“She lives in Grange Walk. Are you sure you have never come across her?”
“Name don’t ring a bell. Might know ’er by sight, I s’pose.”
“She has confessed to committing the three poisonings we are already investigating.”
“That’s the myst’ry solved then!”
“Only partly,” said James. “We are still looking for Catherine Curran, who was married to the three men who appear to have died in suspicious circumstances. We believe she is travelling to be reunited with her family in Kent.”
James asked Sergeant Richards to fetch the photographs and we waited a moment while he did so.
“News reporter, yer say?” Mr Taylor said to me.
“That’s right, for the Morning Express,” I replied.
He gave me an appreciative nod and I smiled. I hoped we would be able to confirm that his wife was indeed Catherine Curran.
The sergeant returned with the photographs and James showed them to Mr Taylor.
“Does the lady in these pictures look familiar to you?”
Mr Taylor studied them carefully, squinting slightly to ensure that his eyes were properly focused.
I saw his mouth slowly open. “That’s ’er all right!”
“Are you sure?” asked James.
“Yep! In ev’ry one of ’em! It’s ’er each time over.”
“We believe it to be Catherine Curran in each of these pictures. However, you gave us a different name: Jane Vincent.”
“Aye. I always knew ’er by that name.”
“Do you believe it to be her true name?”
“Aye.”
“In that case she may have changed her first name to Catherine.”
“S’pose she mighta done. Who’s the men she’s with?”
“The men she has married since she married you,” replied James.
“That’s bigamy, that is!”
“It is if she’s still legally married to you,” said James.” Do you have a copy of the marriage certificate?”
“Not no more.
”
“Which church did you marry in? We can check the records there.”
“St Mary’s in Lambeth. By Lambeth Palace, it is.”
“Excellent. Thank you very much for your help, Mr Taylor. We now have further cause to arrest Catherine Curran. Or Jane Vincent. Presumably she called herself Jane Taylor after she married you.”
“Aye. By rights that’s what ’er name should still be now.”
I gave James a nod. We both knew that Jane Taylor was the name Catherine had been using during her time on the run.
Mr Taylor rubbed his brow, his jaw still hanging open in amazement. “I never would ’ave thought it of ’er. Three more ’usbands!”
“And all dead,” added James. “It seems you had a lucky escape, Mr Taylor.”
“Four husbands now,” I said once Benjamin Taylor had departed. “How many more could there possibly be?”
“She was twenty when she married Mr Taylor,” said James. “Let’s just hope she didn’t find the time for any marriages before that. I shall ask L Division in Lambeth to obtain the records for her marriage to Mr Taylor. Then we will be able to prosecute her for bigamy.”
“If we can find her, that is,” I said.
“There is that challenge, of course. Sergeant, have any men been dispatched to Kent yet in a bid to locate Catherine Curran’s family?”
“Yes, to the Orpington area. That’s what you were told, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, Miss Burrell, the sister of Thomas, told us Catherine had family in Orpington,” replied James. “And fortunately the town is not too far from here.”
“So after Mr Taylor left his wife she changed her first name to Catherine and retained the name we suspect is her maiden name, Vincent,” I said.
“It certainly seems that way,” replied James. “When she married Francis Peel she recorded herself as a spinster, which we now know to be untrue.”