The Darwin Affair

by Tim Mason

  Under Field’s watchful eyes and surrounded by another palisade of flesh, the royal party crossed the town by coach without incident and were settled comfortably into the Duke of Hesse-Darmstadt’s borrowed train for the brief ride to Frankfurt. Another marching band awaited them on the platform there, a clutch of dignitaries, and a milling crowd. With growing anxiety, Field watched the light fail as the band played one number after another. Finally, Victoria, Albert, and their entourage stepped down onto the platform to the cheers of the crowd and proceeded to waiting coaches. A teenaged boy, only feet from the Prince, pointed something directly at Albert’s head as he passed. Field engulfed the lad in a crushing embrace, wrenched the pointed object away from the terrified boy, and discovered it to be a little Union Jack on a wooden stick.

  They would spend the night in Frankfurt, at the Hotel d’Angleterre, before resuming their journey. The city itself seemed to pay scant attention to the procession of the English monarch to the hotel; the horse traffic was thick and the merchants and businessmen of Frankfurt had other concerns. At the hotel, though, the reception was elaborate and the speeches long-winded.

  Field and Llewellyn were given a small room opposite Her Majesty’s. Staff labored on for an hour or two after the entourage retired, but finally the gas lamps in the corridor were dimmed by half and all was quiet. Field and Llewellyn stood guard by turns, two hours on, two hours off. They discovered the creaks, knocks, and other unaccountable noises that grow loud when all other sound ceases. At 2 a.m., with Llewellyn on duty, the newly installed hydraulic lift clanked to life and rose to the entourage’s floor, where it stopped. Llewellyn warily approached the ornate cast-iron cage. He turned the knob and flung open the door. It was empty. He shut the door, listened for a moment, and then walked back to Her Majesty’s door. With a clank and a whir that caused Llewellyn to jump, the lift came to life again and sank inexplicably from sight.

  There was no other disturbance until a little after 4 a.m. Field was standing guard. Suddenly he heard footsteps running up the staircase at the end of the corridor. The inspector put his hand on the pistol in his pocket, but it turned out to be a breathless aide-de-camp whom Field recognized.

  “I need Ponsonby or Dugdale,” said the aide. “There’s been a death in the family.”

  “This is Ponsonby’s chamber,” said Field. The man knocked until the door opened to admit him. In a matter of minutes, Colonel Ponsonby, in dressing gown and slippers, was rapping at Victoria and Albert’s suite.

  Soon the gaslights were turned up full and members of the entourage were coming and going, speaking in hushed tones as the word spread: Prince Albert’s stepmother, the Dowager Duchess Marie, had died. A night-piercing shriek went up from the floor below, but when Field rushed to investigate, he found it to be one of the young serving women he’d seen earlier, unpacking royal dresses.

  “Dear God,” she wept, “Her Majesty is going to need full mourning! Her and the entire court! Where is it to come from? However am I to manage it?”

  Dawn brought much coming and going in response to the royal bereavement. The train’s departure was put back two hours. Proper mourning attire for the entourage was sent for by telegraph. In the meantime, black armbands were being sewn and distributed to the men, and black veils found for the Queen and the ladies. A revised protocol was hastily put into place. Military salutes along the rest of the route were canceled and the marching bands banished.

  By the time everyone had been transported back to the train, Field and Llewellyn were bleary with exhaustion. A woman in the train’s galley gave them steaming cups of tea and rounds of buttery toast, which they consumed gratefully. While they ate and drank, the policemen were unaware of an exchange taking place on the platform between Colonel Ponsonby and Major Davenant, the head groom. It seemed one of the Queen’s horses, newly arrived at Frankfurt on the Fairy, had gone lame.

  “Suzette seemed to be fine yesterday, sir, aboard the tender. We took all four horses off and stabled ’em here overnight, and this morning we made the unhappy discovery.”

  “Why are you telling me this, Davenant?” said Ponsonby. “Monsieur Kanné is in charge of travel matters.”

  “He’s gone off, sir.”

  “What do you mean, he’s gone off?”

  “Left his position, sir, or was let go by Sir Horace, depending who you talk to. Just last night. He’s on his way back to London, I heard, in a right huff.”

  “Well, what the devil am I to do about it?”

  “Permission to replace Suzette, sir? I didn’t know who else to turn to.”

  “Well, of course you must replace her!”

  “Also, sir, can I have Sims back, sir?”

  “Peter Sims? Whatever do you mean, have him back?”

  “He’s always off with these detective fellows we’re not supposed to know about, but I need him, now the second groom’s done a bunk.”

  “The second groom has done a bunk?” repeated the colonel with rising heat.

  “He’s been off the drink for near a year now, sir, but I fear someone may have led him astray.”

  “Good God, Davenant, your entire department needs setting to rights, and I mean to see to it the moment we’re home again!”

  Thus did Peter Sims resume his normal duties with the royal horses and carriages. He was, in fact, the groom who tended the new mare, a beautiful chestnut named Lily, for the remainder of the journey to Coburg. The young man who had brought her forward at the Frankfurt stables was taken on by Davenant as well. Not only was he an English boy, but he had a smattering of German, and that was bound to come in handy.

  35

  The fog was gone. The air was crisp and autumnal and carried a scent of apples. Despite the sad news of death in the night, a feeling of excitement grew among the train’s passengers, from the Queen downward. In just hours they would be in Albert’s homeland. Even the two weary policemen harbored renewed hope: soon their royal charges would be within doors and less exposed to public view.

  A dispatch bag of mail had caught up with the royal party at Frankfurt, and its contents were distributed throughout the morning as the train made its way along the banks of the river Main. Amid the dozens of official letters and personal posts was one addressed to Detective Field in the familiar hand of his wife’s. He opened it, frowning, and read the brief note twice.

  “Good Lord, my good wife is now housing Mrs. Andrews! And belatedly realizes she is acquainted with Decimus Cobb from her nursing days!”

  Field passed the letter to Llewellyn. When he’d read it, he shook his head. “This Miss Coffin is clearly the Andrews woman. Why would Mrs. Field invite her to stop in your own home?”

  “She is trying to help, Sam. God help us, she’s playing at being Mrs. Bucket.”

  “It’s no accident the old witch turned up, chatting with Mrs. Ginty—she sought her out, sir.”

  “Of course she did. Mrs. Field thinks she’s the spy, whereas I rather think it’s the other way round. Now what do I do?”

  There was a rap on the compartment door and Llewellyn opened it to Sir Horace Dugdale. “His Highness the Prince wishes to speak with you, Detective Field.” Gone were the amiable tone, the genteel smile. Sir Horace turned brusquely and led the way up the corridor while Field hurried to follow. Albert was in a compartment fitted out like an office, going over documents with Colonel Ponsonby, all the men wearing black armbands.

  “Ah, thank you, Sir Horace,” said the Prince, looking up. “You and Ponsonby may leave me alone now with Field.”

  The inspector stood at attention as the other two men left the compartment, sliding shut the door behind them.

  “So, Inspector?” said the Prince.

  “May I offer, sir, my condolences on your loss.”

  “Yes, yes, yes, thank you. Have you anything to report to me, Mr. Field?”

  “A few days before Your Highness arrived at Antwerp we believe our man was in a town only a few miles distant.”

  “What
makes you think so, Inspector?”

  Field raised his eyes and stared above the Prince’s head. “He did a mischief there.”

  “A grave mischief?”

  “I am afraid so, sir.”

  “Involving someone connected with me?”

  “No, sir. Involving someone of no importance. Except of course to her family, her parents, a young man perhaps, a child.”

  “An innocent victim.”

  “It seems so, Your Highness.”

  “And the people who set this monster on,” said Albert with rising heat, “are respectable. Known to me. Friends, even, of mine, of Her Majesty. Please, Mr. Field, tell me that Bishop Wilberforce is not truly mixed up in this, as your man suggested. The Queen is very fond of him, and, in a way, so am I.”

  “I interviewed the bishop at length, sir, and I think he lives in a world of words. I believe he was genuinely horrified to learn that words might have consequences in what most people would consider to be the real world.”

  “Not complicit, you think?”

  “No, sir.”

  Albert sighed deeply and looked out the window at the passing landscape. “All this to stop us bestowing an honorific on Mr. Darwin! How can it be? Do his theories truly pose for these people a threat of such magnitude that they would stoop to any depth in order to suppress them?”

  “If I may, sir, I’ve read Mr. Darwin’s book, and although I didn’t entirely follow it, I can see how it would have a leveling effect if it was to catch on. It’s destabilizing of the established order, if you get my meaning. Dangerous, sir, even to monarchs.”

  “Especially to monarchs, I suppose. All things in flux, ever changing, the only hierarchy being that of survival. But thereby making possible, nonetheless, ‘endless forms most beautiful.’”

  “Yes, I was took by the phrase, too, sir. Saved it for the last, didn’t he, Mr. Darwin.”

  “You are a surprising policeman, Field. Mr. Dickens did well to choose you for his model.”

  “No, he didn’t, sir, if you’ll forgive me. I am a very ordinary policeman. Mr. Dickens invented the Bucket fellow. Made him up out of whole cloth.”

  “Perhaps, Field, this invention is not so uncommon. Perhaps, sir, Prince Albert is an invention, too. From the whole cloth, as you say.” The Prince suddenly pointed up, out the window. “Look there. We are passing the Schloß Marienburg.”

  Field stooped and peered up at a massive walled castle. Below, the greenish-gray river was spanned by an arched stone bridge.

  “This is Würzberg, Inspector. Here were many women burned at the stake. Six hundred and more, in perhaps five years. Old bishop Adolf presided at the fires. They called it ‘the burning times.’ These were, of course, women who had entered into contracts with the devil, as one will do when pressed, or so I’m told.”

  The train rounded a bend and the fortress was gone.

  “I am a God-fearing man,” said Albert. “A devout man, if I say it myself. But according to these people, I have contracted with the devil and so I must burn. How many other lovers of knowledge would they send to the pyre? And in the meantime, we risk the monumental work of Darwin being dismissed for another generation. Perhaps for two generations. What a loss that would be! It is not acceptable, Mr. Field. As to the great men who conceived this plot, my ministers and I, in absolute secrecy, will find a way to make them pull their heads into their shells, like the great old tortoises of the Galápagos.”

  “Ah, sir, the Galápagos!” Field’s eyes shone. “He had me on the edge of my seat there, did Mr. Darwin. I wished I was there with him.”

  “In the meantime,” continued the Prince, “find this fiend and stop him, Mr. Field. We must expect great things from even the ordinary policeman. Good day.”

  “Excuse me, sir, but there’s one thing more. A confederate of this evil man, a woman, has insinuated herself into my own home. I believe my wife to be at risk.”

  “Why did you not say so at once? I will have Ponsonby send a detachment of the Horse Guard immediately to apprehend this person.”

  “I beg your pardon, sir, please do not.”

  “But if your wife is in danger . . .”

  “Sir, so are you. I believe we must tread softly, especially if this woman has been placed in my household as a spy. If that’s the case, she must have a means of communicating with the man who menaces you. That could reveal him to us. Or she could expose us to him, you see. It’s difficult to know what to do.”

  The Prince stared at the policeman. “You want to go to her,” said Albert.

  “She is the light of my life, sir.”

  “I understand you.”

  Field sighed. “May I send Mr. Llewellyn back to London to look after this matter?”

  “Of course, Mr. Field. Have Monsieur Kanné attend to his travel arrangements.”

  “Mr. Kanné is gone, sir.”

  “Gone? Nonsense.”

  “Dismissed, I was told.”

  “That cannot be. Monsieur Kanné is indispensable; the Queen is devoted to him. No one could dismiss Kanné except Her Majesty. Godspeed, Mr. Field. May God protect your wife and protect us all from the burners of the world.”

  Within the hour, Sam Llewellyn’s gear was packed and ready for the return trip. When the royal train switched tracks at Lichtenfels, he would disembark and catch the first train running back to Frankfurt.

  “This is madness,” said Field. “After coming all this way.”

  “I know, sir,” said the young constable, locking his trunk. “I never got to see you in a riding habit.”

  “Very amusing. Remember the drill, Sam. It’s a two-man job. Mrs. Andrews knows you. The moment she sees your face, Miss Coffin goes up in smoke and Andrews will try to bolt.”

  “I remember the drill, sir. Who do you suppose sacked Mr. Kanné?”

  “I make it out to be either Ponsonby or Dugdale.”

  “Never!”

  “Who else has the rank? I will be eager to see who is now in charge of making travel arrangements for the Prince.”

  “Hard to believe, sir, that someone right here, in the innermost circle, might be a part of the conspiracy,” said Llewellyn as the brakes squealed and the train began to slow.

  “‘I follow him to serve my turn upon him.’ That’s Shakespeare, Sam.”

  The train’s whistle blew and it juddered to a halt. “I don’t like leaving you on your own, sir.”

  “No more do I like it, Sam. Convey my regards to my wife, Sam, if you will.”

  “I will, sir.”

  “Take care, son.”

  “And you, sir. Good luck!”

  The inspector watched his constable cross the platform and disappear into the little station, feeling a pang.

  The switching process was laborious. The train reversed, exhaled gusts of steam, and then crept forward again. Field moved along the corridor from one car to the next. The door to the monarch’s compartment was open and Field caught a glimpse of Her Majesty chatting with her longtime physician, Sir James Clark. Albert sat close beside her, the two of them holding hands as she spoke.

  “Vicky tells me the baby is a perfect lamb and has my Albert’s beautiful eyes. Of course, you were there at the birth, Sir James—is it true about the baby’s eyes?”

  The royal surgeon smiled and shook his head in silent wonder at the beauty of the infant’s eyes.

  Field moved on, then paused before a window in the corridor. The train was moving slowly out of the station, leaving the tiny town behind. There on a country road was a man on a black horse, trotting alongside the train, just keeping pace with it. He was a tall man. He stood in the stirrups. From his garb he looked to be a workingman or an artisan, but his impressive horse and even his neatly trimmed blond beard seemed to speak of a higher station. His infinitely deep eyes were fixed on the royal carriages.

  Field ran back to the coupling between the cars and stood between them in the open air. The horseman was not more than twenty feet from him, now looking
off into the wood, opposite the rail line. Field had only ever seen Decimus Cobb twice: first, at the great Oxford debate, and then again when the man was halfway across Smithfield Market.

  Field put his hand on the pistol concealed in his coat. The horseman looked back at the train, saw Field, and lifted his cap to him with the flicker of a smile.

  Dear Lord, it’s him.

  As Field drew his gun, the train picked up speed; the horseman fell behind. Cursing, Field ran back into the next carriage and sped the length of the corridor, forced to stop at one point for a lady-in-waiting and her voluminous dress to pass him, his pistol hidden again. Then the inspector hurried to the next coupling.

  The horseman had spurred his stallion and was gaining on the train. Field braced himself against the carriage and took aim.

  “Decimus Cobb!” he cried.

  The train jolted, slowed suddenly, and the horseman passed the policeman, grinning back at him over his shoulder. Field sped forward once more. He reemerged onto the coupling. The train was drawing abreast of the rider. Field half-squatted to retain his balance and leaned against the carriage.

  He’s had his warning.

  As the rider came directly into range, not a dozen feet from him, Field slowly squeezed the trigger. The explosion sent crows screaming up from the branches of the trees. A cloud of smoke hung where Decimus Cobb had been a moment earlier. Field stared in disbelief, watching Decimus wheeling his mount from the road, plunging into the woods and disappearing.

  The royal tender steamed serenely up the Main, her paddle wheels steadily churning the murky waters. Tom drew the brush down over Lily’s flanks, again and again, whispering into her twitching ears.

  “You wasn’t made for boats, was you? No more was I. Soon we’ll be off it, girl, with sod beneath us and fresh grass.”