The Tick of Death

CHAPTER 3

Cribb’s course at the Arsenal ended in an unexpected way early on May 31st, 1884.

The sound of the morning mug of tea arriving on his locker was followed by a deferential cough. ‘Your beverage, Sergeant,’ a voice announced, ‘and if you would be so decent as to down it at your earliest convenience-’

What the devil! He turned his head on the pillow.

‘-you’ll be ready for the van which is already on its way from Scotland Yard for you,’ continued the duty constable, a mealy-mouthed member of the Woolwich establishment he had scarcely noticed before. ‘I was most particularly instructed to rouse you and advise you in a civil manner to be packed and ready to leave by six. Begging your pardon, Sergeant.’

Scotland Yard? The fellow might have said Timbuctoo for all the significance it had at 5.30 a.m., three weeks into the explosives course. He groped for the programme on his locker. ‘It’s Saturday. Blast effects and craters. I have it written here.’

‘Yes, Sergeant. The platoon has already passed through the gates on its way to dynamite the demonstration area.’

Cribb gripped the sides of the bed. ‘Then what the blazes are you going on about police vans for?’

‘Orders from the Yard, Sergeant. A telegraph from Inspector Jowett arrived during the night. They want you urgently.’

If Jowett had got up in the night to send a telegraph, the urgency was extreme.

‘Then you’d better stop the platoon before it starts the dynamiting.’

‘I couldn’t do that, Sergeant, with respect. That’s an army matter. We have no authority to interfere in army matters.’

‘Confound it, man, they’ll be doing their dynamiting for nothing. I shan’t be here.’

‘Ah, but they’ll still need the craters.’

‘Whatever for?’

‘Filling in, Sergeant. There’s a fatigue-party laid on for this afternoon. They parade at half past twelve, draw spades from the store at one o’clock and commence filling in at a quarter past. I stand to be corrected, but I don’t think the army would appreciate having to change all that on the Saturday before the Whitsun holiday.’

Cribb took a mouthful of tea. ‘Why should I agitate myself about the army anyway? Get me some toast and dripping, lad. I’m damned sure Jowett hasn’t invited me to the Yard for breakfast.’

The journey there confirmed that impression. It was not the kind of jaunt that kindled the stomach-juices. The van-driver took the streets of Greenwich and Deptford at the gallop, as if all the cat’s meat men and milk-boys were Red Indians in ambush. Cribb, inside, braced himself grimly against the seat-back and tried to imagine what exigency justified such driving.

There was a marked slowing of the pace after Westminster Bridge, not unconnected, Cribb decided, with the fact that they were now in ‘A’ Division, the home of the Yard itself. But the driver disabused him of that notion by saying through the communication-window: ‘Sorry about the holdup, Sergeant. The traffic’s jammed all the way along Whitehall. It’ll be the crowds ahead, I reckon.’

Crowds? Before eight in the morning on Saturday in Whitehall? Who could they be-Socialists? Suffragists? Extraordinary time for a public demonstration.

‘You’d be just as quick on foot, if I might suggest it,’ the driver went on. ‘It’ll take us twenty minutes this way.’

He was right. It would be quicker to foot it, so long as he didn’t find himself in the thick of a demonstration. ‘What’s going on this morning?’ he asked.

‘Sight-seers, I reckon, Sergeant. There was a crowd already gathering in the Yard when I left soon after six this morning.’

Cribb had never regarded Great Scotland Yard as one of the sights of London. Visitors from the provinces occasionally called at the Convict Office and in return for a small contribution to police funds were taken up to the garret to see a collection of grisly relics that had come to be known as the Criminal Museum, but the Yard itself was otherwise one of the dullest spots in the capital-until this morning, apparently. Well, he was damned if he would ask the van-driver a second time what was going on. ‘I shall make my way on foot, then, Constable.’

‘Very well, Sergeant. Inspector Jowett said you was to report to him in his usual office.’

Confounded cheek, telling him where to report, as if Jowett had ever said such a thing. Some of these drivers seemed to think that managing a pair of horses successfully gave them a privileged position in the Force. Why, a man like Thackeray had never breathed an insubordinate word in all the time he had known him, yet here was this jumped-up stable-lad coolly giving orders to a sergeant after driving him across London at a rate that could only be described as hair-raising.

He was glad of the walk to cool his temper a little. The way he felt on leaving the van, he was liable to say something to Jowett he might regret. Besides, he was actually making quicker progress than the line of vehicles. Some of the cabmen had resignedly attached nosebags to their horses’ heads. But his fellow-pedestrians interested him more than the traffic. There were more travelling in his direction than one usually encountered, and by no means all were Civil Servants on their way to work. By their appearance, many were members of the poor class who had trooped across Westminster Bridge from the backstreets of Lambeth, some in considerable groups, children, parents and grandparents marching purposefully up Whitehall, bright-eyed with the expectation of some family treat in store.

At a loss to account for it, Cribb strode briskly on until the press of people beyond the Horse Guards slowed him to a shuffle. The Yard itself, when he reached it, was as thick with humanity as a painting by Frith. The concourse had come to an enforced stop. They stood shoulder to shoulder, bowler to bowler. Infants sat astride their fathers’ backs and snatched at the tassels of passing parasols. Newspaper-boys and fruit-sellers had materialised from nowhere and bawled their wares into the captive ears around them.

Being tall, Cribb could glimpse the helmets of a police cordon controlling the crowd. He pressed forward with difficulty. It was some minutes before he reached the front ranks. There, the reason for the crowd’s presence came dramatically in sight.

A hole about fifteen feet by twenty had been blasted in the Criminal Investigation Department. Debris was scattered widely across the quadrangle, amongst it broken cupboards, a battered safe and the remains of two carnages, a landau and a brougham. The front of the Rising Sun, on the opposite side, was in ruins, although the landlord had contrived an entrance for the public, who were paying to look inside. Every window in the Yard had been shattered by the explosion. Workmen were engaged in shoring up the Police Office with wooden beams.

Cribb reached the police-line, was recognised, and passed through, stepping over the rubble with a sureness of foot quite recently acquired. The entrance was on the side away from the explosion. He mounted the stairs to Jowett’s office.

‘Kindly leave the door open behind you,’ the Inspector called to him as he went in. ‘We shall at least be able to breathe if there is an unobstructed passage of air. This dust is asphyxiating me by degrees.’ He was seated at his usual desk in front of a window-frame empty except for a few jagged segments of glass. A large fall of plaster from the ceiling had all but obliterated the tufted rug to which, as a senior officer, he was entitled. A thin film of white dust lay over everything in the room, including his hair and suit. ‘Unfortunately, there is nowhere else for us to talk.’

‘When did this happen, sir?’

‘Shortly after nine o’clock last night. One of the newspapers has already produced a special edition to report it. I have been here myself since the small hours.’ He stroked the unshaven bristles on his chin to emphasise his quick response to the emergency. ‘They sent a cab out to South Norwood for me.’

Better than a police-van, thought Cribb. ‘Is this the work of the Clan-na-Gael, sir?’

‘Without a shadow of doubt. Did you notice which room was the target of the attack?’

‘It looked to me like the Hackney Carriage Licensing Department, sir.’

‘No, on the upper floor. It is the room next to this, the new headquarters of the Special Irish Branch. They have struck directly at the officers who are investigating them. If that isn’t the Clan snapping its fingers in our faces, I don’t know what is.’

‘Was anyone hurt, sir?’

‘Several. None fatally, we think. P.C. Clarke, the constable on duty in the Yard, was blown against a wall and suffered a severe scalp wound. Six others, including a coachman and the barmaid from the Rising Sun, are in Charing Cross Hospital. Mercifully, no one was in the office at the time. It is extensively damaged, as you may imagine.’ Jowett paused, and frowned. ‘I have not seen inside, but I doubt whether my telephone-set has survived.’

‘I’m sorry, sir. One other point: I wouldn’t wish to criticise a man in no position to defend himself, but if P.C. Clarke was on duty in the Yard, how was it that he didn’t notice the infernal machine before it exploded?’

‘A perfectly proper observation, Cribb. The answer is that it was not in view. The dynamitards had secreted it in what one might describe as a convenient hiding-place adjoining the wall of the building.’

‘Oh? What was that, sir?’ said Cribb, blankly.

Jowett looked embarrassed and ran his hand over the back of his head, producing a small halo of dust. ‘Well, not to beat about the bush. .’

‘Ah! The public urinal, sir! Perfectly sited for their devilish purpose.’

‘Exactly so.’

‘That would account for the blast effects,’ said Cribb, pleased to air his new expertise. ‘The vertical thrust of the blast quite surprised me. The bricks have been displaced to a height of up to twenty feet. The urinal acted like a cannon, you see. Instead of the force being dispersed in all directions from the point of detonation, it was concentrated upwards. Curious-I was due for a practical demonstration of blast effects this morning. I didn’t know the Clan was going to provide it for me.’

‘You have not seen all that they provided,’ said Jowett.

‘What do you mean, sir?’

‘There were two other explosions last night, in St James’s Square. The Junior Carlton Club was attacked at eighteen minutes past nine. Fifteen seconds after, there was a second explosion across the Square, at Sir Watkin Wynn’s residence.’

‘A private residence? What have they got against Sir Watkin Wynn?’

‘Nothing at all. It was patently a mistake. The target must have been Winchester House next door, which is government property.’

‘And the Junior Carlton Club?’

‘Now that is interesting.’ Jowett opened a book on his desk. ‘This is a copy of the London Directory. In the section on St James’s Square there is no mention of the club. You see, its front entrance is in Pall Mall, and the back, in the Square, is used by tradesmen and servants. A foreigner to London might well turn to the Directory as an authority and gain the impression that the back entrance of the club, which is indistinguishable from any other mansion, is, in fact, Adair House, the home of the War Office Intelligence Department.’

‘Good Lord! The Special Branch and the Secret Service on one night! These fellows don’t do things by halves. What was the damage in St James’s Square?’

‘Mostly superficial, I am glad to report. It is miraculous that nobody was killed. The parts of the Junior Carlton occupied by members were almost untouched, but the kitchen and the servants’ quarters suffered somewhat. The bomb had been left at the foot of an iron staircase leading to the basement. The second bomb, at Sir Watkin Wynn’s, shattered all the windows there and in the Duke of Cleveland’s mansion next door, but the fullest force of the impact was curiously diverted at an angle of ninety degrees to Adair House. It brought down the mortar and dashed out the windows with such a powerful concussion that for a time it was believed there had been three explosions in the Square.’

‘That’s a nobby area, sir. Railway stations are one thing, noble residences quite another.’

‘Don’t I know it! Our list of witnesses reads like Burke’s Peerage. Unfortunately, they all appeared after the explosions. Now, Cribb, I have something more to show you, but I am interested to know what your observations are thus far, coming fresh from the explosives course, as you do.’

Fresh was not the word he would have used to describe his condition after three weeks at Woolwich. ‘I would need to see the places where the bombs were placed, sir. Possibly I could tell you then which method of detonation was used. The remnants of a clock-timing device are nearly always detectable at the place where the charge has exploded.’

‘Yes, yes. But what have you got to say about the organisation of the crime?’

What was he coming to? Best tread warily. ‘Well-planned, I should say, sir, allowing that there seem to have been some mistakes in St James’s Square. Possibly the perpetrators were less efficient than the plotters. Friday evening was a good one to choose.’

‘To have the maximum effect upon the populace over the Bank Holiday? You’re right, of course. The Local Government Board explosion last year coincided with the Easter Holiday, if I remember. Everyone came out to watch, as they will this weekend.’

‘There’s also the question of the Oaks, sir.’

‘The Oaks? What has a blasted horse-race got to do with it?’

‘The number of constables withdrawn for duty at Epsom, sir. We’re always under-staffed on Oaks Day. It’s a thing an Irishman might think of.’

‘An Irish-American?’

‘I wouldn’t know, sir.’

Jowett pushed back his chair and stood up, to the sound of splintering glass. ‘Let us not deceive ourselves, Sergeant. I spoke to you before of our concern at the knowledge the dynamite party appears to have of our methods. You remember the matter of the reliefs at the railway stations? We now appear to face an enemy which has got to know the very room in which the campaign against it is being mounted. Which passes freely into Scotland Yard to deposit an infernal machine in a convenience under our very-er-’

‘Noses, sir?’

‘Noses. And walks away without anyone noticing a thing. Doesn’t that tend to confirm that the Clan-na-Gael is as knowledgeable about police matters as you or I or the Commissioner himself?’

‘I’m afraid it does, sir.’

‘At least we understand each other. Now, if you will come with me, I shall show you the other discovery of which I spoke.’

Jowett lifted his bowler hat from the stand, blew off a layer of dust, and led Cribb out of his office and downstairs. In the Yard outside, they negotiated the debris and made their way to a grille situated at the foot of a wall, out of view of the crowd. A black bag was resting on it.

‘We put it where it could cause the least damage,’ Jowett explained. ‘No one here knew whether it was liable to explode, you understand. However, Colonel Martin himself came out to see it during the night and he has pronounced it harmless. You may examine it if you wish.’

Cribb crouched beside the bomb-for the charred end of a fuse protruding from the bag left no doubt of its identity. He felt inside and took out a piece of brass tubing, into which the other end of the fuse was inserted, and secured by a nipper. Fortunately the fuse had gone out before the flame reached the fulminate. He felt the bag’s weight. Six or seven pounds, he estimated-quite enough to reduce a sizeable building to rubble. He tipped the dynamite out on the ground at his feet. From the corner of his eye, he noticed Jowett’s shoes take a long step backwards. Without looking round, he picked up one of the cakes of dynamite and examined it. Atlas Powder: a standard six-ounce disc.

‘It looks as though the dynamiters have given up the clockwork method of detonation, sir,’ he told the Inspector, who remained just within earshot. ‘Fuses may be dangerous to use, but they’re clearly more successful. I wonder what stopped this one from working.’

‘A small boy, if my information is correct,’ said Jowett. ‘He saw the thing smouldering and stamped it out with the heel of his boot, resourceful lad. Then he drew it to the attention of a constable on duty in the Square.’

‘The Square? Which square was that, sir?’

‘Trafalgar, no less. The bomb was quietly fizzing at the foot of Nelson’s Column, beside the Landseer lion that looks towards St Martin’s. These people will stop at nothing, Cribb. Nelson’s Column-imagine!’

Cribb declined to imagine. It would take more than seven pounds of Atlas Powder to shift Nelson from his perch. The lion might have looked a little the worse for the experience, he was ready to admit.

‘The prospect leaves me speechless, too,’ Jowett went on. ‘Would you believe that the constable who found the thing brought it over from Trafalgar Square in a hansom? When he arrived I was engaged in conversation with Inspector Littlechild, of the Special Branch, assessing the damage to the Rising Sun over a glass of porter that the landlord had most civilly provided. The devastation around us weighed heavily on our minds, Cribb, for when the fellow stumbled in carrying the black bag and muttering something about an infernal machine, we moved as one-straight behind the counter on our knees with the barman. It is a long time since I was constrained to do anything so undignified. After a minute’s precautionary interval, we prevailed upon the constable by signals to convey the bag out of the Rising Sun and deposit it on the grille here. We were not in a position to know that the bomb was no longer active, you appreciate.’

Cribb stood up. Jowett’s self-justifying held no interest for him. It was time the conversation changed. ‘What’s your reason for bringing me here, sir?’

‘Eh?’ The directness of the question-coming as it did from a mere detective-sergeant-produced the effect on Jowett that infernal machines did. He took a step backwards.

Cribb leaned towards him. ‘I appreciate the gravity of the situation, sir, and I can see that what has happened here has a certain bearing on what we talked about three weeks ago, before I was sent to Woolwich. But if you’ve had Colonel Martin, the Inspector of Explosives, here, what’s the purpose of sending for me? Three weeks don’t count for much in experience of bombs, sir.’

‘Granted. That is all you are going to get, however,’ said Jowett, recovering his poise. ‘You will not be returning to the Arsenal. Your services are otherwise required. It is manifestly clear, is it not, that the Clan-na-Gael must have been in possession of privileged information to carry out last night’s detestable work?’

‘Looks like that, sir.’

‘And who do you suppose provided them with such information?’

‘I can’t imagine, sir,’ said Cribb. It was not strictly true. A possibility had stirred in his brain the moment he saw the devastation in the Yard.

‘Can’t you? I can. I am not so confoundedly sentimental. You know as well as I which member of the C.I.D. has been drinking with Irish-Americans.’

‘That was weeks ago, sir.’

‘Do you suppose we have not been following his movements ever since? Constable Bottle of the Special Branch was assigned to that duty before you left for Woolwich-a first-rate man, I might add. We set him up in rooms in Paradise Street, so that he was able to maintain a continuous vigil. He gave us a comprehensive written report on your encounter with Thackeray at London Bridge-and afterwards in The Feathers.’

‘Waste of paper,’ said Cribb. ‘If you’d asked me, I’d have told you all you wanted to know, sir.’

‘Possibly,’ said Jowett, without much conviction. ‘That is of small account now, however. I think you should know, Cribb, that when I arrived here in the early hours of this morning and took in this unbelievable scene, my first action was to send a telegraph to Bottle, demanding an immediate account of Thackeray’s movements in the last forty-eight hours. The message was not delivered because Bottle was out of his rooms.’

‘At that time, sir?’

‘My own reaction exactly. I therefore sent a second message to Paradise Street police station to establish the whereabouts of Constable Thackeray. I was informed by return message that he was absent without permission, having failed to report for the midnight roll-call in the section-house. The news did not surprise me. It matched the information about Bottle. It was reasonable to assume that Thackeray’s disappearance was not unconnected with the outrages here and in St James’s Square, and that Bottle was on his trail.’

Jowett paused. Cribb waited expressionlessly.

‘In that, I was mistaken. A message arrived from Thames Division shortly after four o’clock. A body was taken from the river in the early hours of this morning in Limehouse Reach. Special Branch have already identified it as Bottle. A bullet had penetrated his brain.’