The Hellfire Conspiracy

9

“’Lo, push!”

The street arab I’d caught the day before came running toward us with a note in his hand. He was out of breath and after delivering it into my employer’s hand, he leaned against a building, gasping for breath. It was my experience that these boys were out of doors much of the time and accustomed to walking the city. He must have trotted all over the East End looking for us.

Barker unfolded the note, and I saw his shoulders sag. There was only one event that could have caused such a reaction.

“She’s dead, isn’t she?” I asked, putting a few bob into the street boy’s hand and sending him on his way.

Barker nodded and looked away.

“Floating in the river like the others?” I asked. “Where?”

“She was found among the construction pilings at Tower Bridge. They are bringing the Thames police steam launch to collect the body. We are to meet them in Wapping.”

“I’m sorry, sir.”

The Guv scratched his ear. “Our chances were even at best, lad. I knew that when I took the case.”

No hansom in London could have brought us there fast enough to suit me. I could feel the blood rushing at my temples, and at one point in our journey I wanted to vault over the top, push the driver out of his box, and whip some speed out of our horse. As for Barker, he had retreated into himself. I think he was preparing to be humbled. He had not found Miss DeVere’s killer nor had he discovered the body. It is not possible for one man to right every wrong, catch every criminal, or save every victim. I worried that perhaps he felt that success was merely his duty while anything less was failure.

When we arrived, we found that as usual we were late and Inspector Swanson was in possession of the body. The launch had arrived a few minutes before we did, and the little corpse was lying on a flat, two-wheeled barrow, which stood nearly upright. She was huddled down on the bare wood, due to gravity, her sodden clothes and hair dripping on the stone dock. She was dressed in white undergarments: camisole, and pantaloons. Her face, despite the rouge and kohl, was gravely still, and she almost looked as if she were sleeping; almost, I say, for the lids were half open, the bottom of her irises visible and blue. Hamlet’s Ophelia, I thought. She reminded me of Ophelia drowned in some painting I had seen, though it was obvious she had died another way.

“Strangled,” Barker muttered, looking at the purple marks like sooty fingerprints on her slender throat. Then he reached down and raised the delicate wrist of her right arm. The tip of her index finger had been lopped off bloodlessly. I walked to the edge of the dock and looked down, trying not to be so angry that I started rampaging through the streets.

Swanson and Dunham were arguing. Scotland Yard was taking this case seriously, but I recalled when it was just Barker and I and Major DeVere who were searching Bethnal Green for this missing girl before it became a question of jurisdiction and a feather in someone’s cap, with a possible commendation or promotion.

“Have the parents been told?” the Guv asked.

“Not yet,” Swanson said.

“May I be the one to tell them?”

“So you can take the credit?”

“Credit for what?” Barker asked, with a bitter edge to his voice. “What have I accomplished? She’s dead, isn’t she?”

It wasn’t fair, I thought. Barker hadn’t been called in until after Miss DeVere had been taken. In fact, it had been hours later, after her father in his shining helmet had ridden the length and breadth of Bethnal Green. Cyrus Barker did not undertake a case he felt he had no chance of solving, but when he did, he took sole responsibility even, I thought, over matters he could not control.

Swanson shook his head. “I’m sorry, Barker. You are not officially involved in this investigation. The duty falls to me.”

“I need to consult with my client. We’re both going to the same destination,” Barker reasoned, “and I am already paying for a cab, but it is your decision. Of course, I could leave now on my own and devil take the hindmost.”

“I shall take my own vehicle,” Swanson offered. “And if you follow and let us do our job, I shall allow you to enter the residence with me unofficially.”

“It is the most I can expect under the circumstances,” my employer answered.

“Have you examined the body?”

“’Tis a wee lass, Cyrus, and in public,” the inspector replied, looking somewhat uncomfortable. “I thought it best left to the coroner.”

“Cover her up,” Dunham ordered. “Sergeant Bellows, I am leaving you in charge. When the coroner arrives, take down anything he says and then release the body to him.”

“Yes, sir,” the sergeant said, with a tug on his helmet.

“Come, gentlemen,” Swanson said. “We must give the DeVeres the sad news.”

“Do you think,” I asked as we rattled along in the cab behind Swanson and Dunham’s vehicle, “that Major DeVere shall retain our services so we can find Miacca?”

“One never knows in such circumstances,” Barker replied. “First of all, I am not certain that DeVere will be motivated more by a desire to get this over with or by a need to punish his daughter’s killer. Also, he’s got a wife to take into consideration. I doubt he can make any sort of thoughtful decision on the subject just now. We must prepare to be dismissed and we must prepare to continue.”

“I do not envy the inspector his duty,” I said. “This will not be pleasant.”

“It isn’t an easy thing, but Donald has done it dozens of times before. It’s part and parcel of being a C.I.D. man.”

“Forgive me, sir, but are we any closer to finding Mr. Miacca? Do you think we might have caught him if we’d had more time?”

“I’ll admit, Thomas, that this case has been difficult. He is a clever adversary and has left us with precious few clues. But even he shall eventually make a mistake and thereby expose himself, or we shall find that one clue which will break this case open. Miacca isn’t going to stop killing girls. A pot can only simmer so long before it blows off the lid.”

We eventually pulled up in front of a private residence in Fulham. The DeVere family lived in a terraced house in Dawes Lane and the servants saw that everything was clean and polished and painted. It seemed a cruelty to come in and ruin this domestic order.

Donald Swanson said that he would inform the DeVeres that their daughter was dead, and I suppose in a way, he did. When we were halfway out of our vehicles, the door to one of the residences opened and Hypatia DeVere stepped out, arms out at her sides. Her eyes were as large as saucers, and there was an unspoken question on her lips. Without ado, Swanson answered it by removing his bowler and looking down. Dunham, Barker, and I did likewise. The woman went down just then, the way I’ve seen a deer go down when it is shot through the heart by a hunter. Her servants caught her, but they could not stop the wail of grief that escaped her. It reverberated down the street. I cannot imagine a more mournful sound than that of a woman who has just been told that her child is no more.

I thought it was over, but I was wrong. She was only getting her breath. The next cry was even louder. Leaving the prostrate woman to her housekeeper, the butler stepped out the door and took charge, which meant that he herded us in quickly before we attracted any more attention. DeVere came downstairs then, a picture of abject misery, and after trying unsuccessfully to soothe his wife, he had the butler send for their physician. The four of us stood about in the entranceway while the major helped his wife up the stairs.

I’d noted how clean the street was, and now I was impressed by the front hall. Fulham, its streets and its houses had the order of a German village. All was fashionable and well tended. Each house was similar to its neighbors, save one thing. It seemed nothing so common as dirt had any place here and yet, one of those houses had a little girl who’d been murdered. I could not see things going on as they were after this.

An ashen-faced and sober Trevor DeVere came down the stairs a short while later.

Swanson cleared his throat. “Sir, we shall need you to come and identify the body.”

The man I had seen fall apart when I first met him now summoned control of himself.

“Very well, Inspector,” he replied. “Where is she now?”

“In the morgue in Stepney, sir.”

“Cannot she be transferred?”

“There must be a postmortem and inquest.”

“Postmortem? By the heavens, you shall not take a blade to my child,” the major growled, his features turning red.

“It is the law, sir.”

“Then change the law. I won’t have some idiot elected official hacking away at my child’s body so he can have his bloody two quid.”

DeVere was well informed. The coroner’s position was indeed elected, and for each postmortem he performed he received a payment of two pounds. The Stepney coroner, Dr. Vandeleur, was no drinker, which we knew from working with him on earlier cases. He was a competent coroner and medical man, which I’d heard was not always the case.

“When can you come and identify the body, sir?”

“I’ll be there in an hour. I must see that my wife is sedated.”

“Afterward,” Barker added, “perhaps we might confer about what you wish us to do.”

DeVere nodded absently. He rose, nodded again, and left the room. Decorum had been set at naught in deference to the death of a child. We rose and saw ourselves out.

In the street, the Guv thanked Swanson for allowing him to be there, and we left on foot. That morning, Mac had pressed our umbrellas and macintoshes upon us, and I was glad he had, for it began raining. I could not get the image of Gwendolyn DeVere’s face out of my head, with its calm features and half-closed lids. For some reason, she made me think of my late wife, Jenny. I had failed her, as we, Barker and I, had failed Miss DeVere. Men make these promises too cavalierly, I thought, to shelter and protect someone from any harm whatsoever. It is pure swank on our part. Man is not omniscient; he cannot watch everyone twenty-four hours a day; and no man is invincible, not even Cyrus Barker. One can no more escape Fate than one can the rain that now fell upon our umbrellas.

We walked in silence. There was little chance of finding a vehicle in this weather. Barker looked as grim as I had ever seen him. We went a half mile to Waltham Green station and boarded a train.

Eventually we reached Whitehall and the blessed dryness of our antechamber. We shook off our raincoats and hung them, greeted Jenkins in monosyllables, and went into our offices. The Guv sat down in his big leather swivel chair and rested his head in the corner of its wing, ignoring the stack of entreaties from people wishing to hire one of the most illustrious private enquiry agents in London. Instead, he sat forlornly, drawing abstract runes with his finger on the edge of his desk. He did not even take solace with his pipe. Perhaps he thought he did not deserve it.

I am suggestible, and being locked up with a brooding employer did not help my confidence. Barker was going to lose this case, I thought. DeVere was going to come soon and dismiss us. Word would get out of our defeat, and there would be fewer letters requesting our services. The advertisement he placed in The Times would suddenly take on a pleading tone. Barker would begin to consider returning to his old life aboard ship. Perhaps he would sign on as captain aboard a vessel bound for Asia, and where would that leave me? There were two very silent and self-absorbed men in Craig’s Court that day.

DeVere came in from the pouring rain sometime later, looking as if his face were clay and some sculptor had just carved fresh lines around his mouth and eyes. He fell into our visitor’s chair and the breath slowly drained out of him.

“It was she?” Barker asked.

Trevor DeVere nodded.

“You have my condolences, sir, on the loss of your daughter. She is in a better place, but I do not suppose that is of much comfort to you right now. You have several options in front of you. You may discharge me and see to the needs of your wife. In time, perhaps, the two of you will find acceptance in this, if not peace.

“Your second choice is to retain my services and allow me to search for your daughter’s killer. It may take time, but I still believe I can do it. It is possible, however, that finding her murderer will give you cold comfort. It shall not bring her back and will allow the memory of her death to linger in your home for months, even years to come.”

“I came here to sack you, Barker,” DeVere finally said, “though it was against the wishes of my wife. She said that if Gwendolyn could be found, you would be the man to do it. I have no confidence in anyone or anything at the moment, and my wife is too distraught to give me any more advice, but I believe I shall continue to retain your services. That is, if you have the stomach for it.”

“That is well,” Barker said. “I have made a contract with you that I would find the man who took your daughter and I intended to fulfill that contract whether I was working for you or not. In a way, I suppose, I feel I am working for the parents of the other murdered girls who could never afford my services.”

“I do not care for whom you are working, as long as you find the man who murdered my little girl.”

“We are of one accord, then, Major DeVere. You should go now and tend your wife. Mr. Llewelyn and I shall pick up the scent once more. We will track him down, you may rest assured.”

Barker watched him go from the bow window.

“I cannot imagine the crushing strain he must be under,” he said.

“What do we do now?” I asked.

“Let us have lunch at the Northumberland around the corner, and perhaps better fortified, we can see where we erred. We must find our way back onto Miacca’s trail.”

“So, it’s back to Bethnal Green, sir,” I said.

“Indeed,” Barker answered. “Let us go back and discover if we can see things in a different light.”