Waxwork

SATURDAY, 23rd JUNE

‘That solicitor is here. Him that goes red to the tips of his ears when you call him Simon.’

The prisoner stopped. For twenty minutes she had been circling the exercise yard with her bed-blanket round her shoulders. It was cool in the small quadrangle bounded by cell-blocks. The sun penetrated there for four hours a day, between eleven and three. This Saturday morning it had just begun its slow descent down the granite wall.

‘He is waiting in the cell,’ Bell told her.

‘Alone?’

‘Miss, if you please.’

‘Miss,’ the prisoner tonelessly repeated.

‘Who else did you expect-the blooming Home Secretary? Yes, he’s on his own.’

Without hurrying, she crossed the cobbles to the arched doorway leading up to the condemned cells, Bell and Hawkins following.

The young solicitor jerked to his feet as if it was the Queen. Today he was in green tweeds. Each day it was different. When he smiled, boyish creases formed at the corners of his mouth.

‘Miriam.’

‘No touching,’ Bell cautioned.

The prisoner gave him a faint smile and guided her skirts round the table to her stool.

He remained standing while the wardresses found seats. He was a charmer, this one.

‘My dear, how are you this morning?’

‘Impatient for news, as usual,’ she answered.

He nodded. ‘And you shall have some. There has been a development. If it had not kept me so busy I should have come to tell you last night.’ He paused, measuring his words. ‘My dear, Howard is missing. The police want to question him.’

Bell caught her breath at the news and looked at the prisoner. She had widened her eyes a fraction, but she passed no comment.

‘I reminded the officer who informed me, of course, that Howard is under no obligation to notify the police of his movements,’ Allingham went on. ‘From the way I was questioned, you would think he was wanted on some criminal charge. Oh, they had learned from the servants at Park Lodge that he took a portmanteau with him. Scotland Yard seems to interpret that as tantamount to fleeing from justice.’

‘Are they pursuing him?’

‘I understand there are men looking for him at all the ports.’

‘And if they find him?’

Allingham shrugged. ‘If they propose to detain him, they must charge him with something.’

Bell exchanged a glance with Hawkins. From the prisoner’s composure, you would think she was indifferent to her husband’s predicament.

She said a curious thing. ‘Then it’s nearly over, Simon.’

His face lit with encouragement. ‘You have been marvellous. So brave! Yes, nearly over. No doubt they will come to pester you with more questions while they have you in this place, but you must refuse to say one word unless I am present. That is your right.’

She let out a small breath, as if his words had fortified her. A tinge of colour had come back to her cheeks. Exactly why Howard Cromer’s disappearance had lifted her spirit, the wardresses did not understand. They drew conclusions from what they saw. There had been opportunity enough in two weeks locked in a cell with the prisoner eight hours a day to read signals in her voice and expression. She might be sitting upright on her stool with her hands held together, but she was elated by what the solicitor had told her. If she had got the chance she would have hugged him. Between these two there were things going on.

‘Simon, which of the detectives questioned you about Howard? Was it the sharp-faced man with side-whiskers or the second one, with the beard, who pretended not to be a detective at all?’

‘The first.’ Allingham frowned. ‘Why do you ask?’

‘Oh, because I believe I have seen the second. I was not supposed to, but while I was in the exercise yard this morning I happened to look up and saw a face at a window two floors up, staring down at me. He was the man Howard photographed, I am certain-the broad, scarred face, black beard and prominent eyes. Even the butterfly collar. As soon as I caught those codfish eyes he disappeared from view. I had to smile.’

Bell darted a warning glance at Hawkins. A word out of turn now, and either of them could be up before the governor. There were things it was forbidden under any circumstances to discuss with a condemned prisoner.

Allingham had an explanation. ‘Probably he was put on to the case after your trial. He would have had no opportunity of seeing you, except in photographs. He would be better employed meeting the trains at Dover than peering out of prison windows. This entire experience has done nothing to alter my low opinion of our detective force.’

She seemed not to be listening. She was looking at her fingernails, chipped and stained by prison fatigues. ‘Simon.’

He reddened. She had spoken his name with a kind of ardour.

‘In here, my thoughts have been much on the past,’ she said, speaking in a low, earnest tone she had not used before. It seemed to Bell that it was calculated to make the wardresses feel they should not be listening. ‘I think a lot about Hampstead, and the Society. Those interminable lectures that we endured for the conversation afterwards. The picnics and the outings. That trip up the river when you wore your striped blazer. I was never so happy as then.’

The young man began to look uncomfortable. ‘Nor me-capital memories,’ he said tamely.

‘Something we share,’ she said, and paused, watching him. ‘In the night, when it is difficult to sleep, I find my thoughts often turn to what might have happened in my life if things had happened differently. Those were happy times and I thought I understood why, but really I did not. Simon, I was blinkered. I knew nothing of the world. Oh, I basked in its pleasures, the joys of laughter, sunshine, pretty things. Like a child. Such thoughts as I possessed were shaped by impulse. If there were things I desired, chocolates, flowers, anything, I directed all the power at my disposal to obtaining them. And because I was pretty and surrounded by people who adored me I was never thwarted. A selfish, spoilt child.’

‘Come now, that’s too steep,’ Allingham demurred. ‘You have a sweet disposition, always did.’

He was incapable of stopping her now she had started. It was so sudden that it shocked, this baring of the soul by the woman who had consistently refused to confide a word. It seemed indecent, worse than nakedness.

‘I lacked any judgment, Simon,’ she said in a voice that did not expect to be challenged. ‘My actions were determined by impulse alone. Why do you suppose I married Howard? I could not give you a reasoned explanation.’

‘In matters of the heart-’ Allingham started to murmur.

‘It was a whim, like everything else in my life up to that time,’ she said, and her voice became less insistent, dreamier. ‘Howard was there, and I wanted him. I gave it no more thought than if I had seen a bonnet in a shop window. Oh, I don’t mean that my head was not full of him. I doted on him. To me he was charming, handsome, urbane and his prospects were boundless. Yet what I wanted in truth was gratification. I was thinking of myself.’ She sighed. ‘The difference in our ages, his possessive ways, his devotion to photography above all things, I dimly recognised, but I did not consider these as reasons to hesitate. I wanted him as my husband and that was the end of it. The end.’ Her eyes moistened. ‘Nothing would deter me.’

She looked down at her hands again. Nobody spoke.

‘Simon, you of all people must have noticed that Howard and I … that the element one takes for granted in matrimony, the coming together of man and wife-’

Allingham appealed to her, ‘Spare yourself, Miriam. There is no need to … ’

The wardresses sat in silence, pretending to hear nothing, least of all what was unsaid.

The prisoner continued speaking. ‘There had to be disenchantment. Really we entered into marriage without knowing each other.’ She smiled faintly. ‘To Howard I was something between a child and a piece of porcelain. I needed to be guarded, humoured, cherished and photographed. He liked me best when I was silent and completely still.’ She looked away, in her own thoughts. ‘It was difficult for me to accept after our courtship had been so full of variety and companionship. I had imagined the parties would go on as if nothing had changed. Instead I was confined indefinitely in Park Lodge. I might as well have been here. I even had a gaoler until I insisted she was dismissed. Howard didn’t understand why I could not bear the woman. You know him, Simon. A kinder, more solicitous man does not exist. If Howard had made me unhappy from malice I could have rebelled, but he was infinitely kind. He bought me trinkets, chocolates, little toys and hid them in places where I would come upon them unexpectedly. What could I do but persevere, try to convince myself it was not the greatest mistake of my life?’

‘Miriam-’

‘Please listen to me, Simon,’ she said quickly. ‘There is not much more. I believe even now I would be ready to face a life with Howard if he had been as honest with me as he was kind.’

‘What do you mean?’

She hesitated. ‘That he concealed from me the truth about Judith Honeycutt.’

Allingham’s features creased into a look of bewilderment. ‘But, my dear, you knew about Judith.’

She looked at him with a gaze that seemed to penetrate his words and show them to be hollow.

‘There was the inquest,’ he said, trying to fill the space. ‘You knew about the tragedy. We all did. God knows, it was catastrophic for Howard. If he had stayed in Hampstead, it would have ruined him. I don’t mean to be callous about poor Judith, rest her soul, but she did not pause to think-’

She cut through his words with a bare statement. ‘Simon, I know how Judith died.’

He blinked and put his hand to his face. ‘Miriam, what are you saying?’

She said with deliberation, ‘He told me himself. He confessed it to me as he lay beside me in our marriage-bed’-she spoke the word with bitterness-‘at a moment when he felt constrained to reassure me that he was capable of loving a woman. What consolation I was to derive from it, I cannot imagine, because he confided to me, his wife, that he and Judith … that he was responsible for her condition at the time of her death. Whether it was true I doubt, knowing Judith as I did, but that is of no account. Howard believed it. When she told him, it threw him into a state of panic. You know how exercised he becomes about the smallest things. Imagine this! She threatened a scandal unless he married her. To Howard, the suggestion was unthinkable. Whatever had happened between them was a furtive, foolish thing, no basis for matrimony. In his mental anguish he decided there was only one escape: to do away with her.’

Allingham said, ‘Miriam, for God’s sake. This can’t be true!’

Her colour was high. She began speaking more rapidly, unsubdued by his protest. ‘You can be frank with me. You were a true friend to Howard. You saved him, told him what to say at the inquest-’

‘No, no!’ Allingham agitatedly said. ‘Nothing of the kind.’

‘Simon, he told me the truth himself. Too late. By then I had married him. Can you imagine how I felt being the wife of a … ’ She smothered the word with an inrush of breath. ‘If there had ever been any prospect of our marriage succeeding, it ended that night he told me this.’

Allingham was white. In a voice just audible, he said, ‘Miriam, I knew nothing of this. Nothing.’

‘I wanted you to know.’

As words stopped between them, the sound of his breathing filled the cell. The prisoner appeared calmer, her hands resting loosely on her lap while she waited for him to absorb what she had said.

In a lower key she resumed. ‘Perhaps you can understand what it does to a woman to be told such a thing. The last vestiges of those girlish dreams of mine vanished in a second. My husband was a stranger to me. He has been ever since. You are not blind, Simon. You must have seen for yourself.’

‘Yes,’ he answered in a whisper. ‘I could not fail to notice.’

‘You had seen me go wilfully into marriage with Howard. You knew it was madness, didn’t you?’ she said. ‘You foresaw the frustrations I would visit on myself. Tell me I detected from you the suggestion that I should think again. I mean those times you glanced at me in your special way or brushed your hand against mine.’

The young man flushed with embarrassment.

‘I like to think you were trying to tell me in your own way about your secret sentiments. Simon, I would not speak like this if I could avoid it. Perhaps I am deceiving myself again, but I thought-I like to believe-’

He responded. ‘You are right. If I could have spoken to you … I knew it would make no difference.’

‘Yes.’ A tear slid from her eye. She let it move slowly down her cheek.

They said nothing for what seemed a long interval.

The prisoner ended it. ‘Simon, if there were a chance to begin again, as we were in the Hampstead days, before I married Howard, do you think it possible that you and I-knowing all you did about the kind of person I am-’

‘I can think of nothing I would rather wish for,’ he gently interposed.

She smiled, and sniffed to keep back tears, bowing her head.

‘It is better to forget such thoughts,’ he said.

Her eyes came up slowly to meet his and fix them with a look of extraordinary intensity. ‘There is a way.’

He appeared not to understand.

She said, ‘If they find Howard, they will arrest him.’

‘They would be obliged to pardon you before any magistrate would issue a warrant,’ he said.

‘Howard will be brought to trial, as I was, unless he can convince them he is innocent and they drop the charge.’

Allingham still wore a frown. ‘That is true, but-’

She hesitated, watching him. ‘If it … happened … that he was unable to convince them-’

‘Miriam, what are you saying?’

‘That I should be free in the real meaning of the word.’

He shook his head. ‘Not that way.’ His hand went to the nape of his neck and clutched it. ‘No, I could never bring myself-’

‘Simon, he is guilty. Judith died in agony. Whatever view the law might take of the present case … ’

Articulating each word as if it caused pain, he said, ‘I could not do that to Howard.’

‘Not for my sake?’ she asked, her voice rising challengingly.

‘He is your husband.’

‘In name only.’ She closed her eyes and said, ‘Simon, you are a man!’

He sat staring at her.

Bell, no less than he, was stunned. Emotional scenes were usual in the condemned cell. Until today, the prisoner had been unexampled in her self-control. Cold-blooded, she had seemed. Whatever was going on between these two-and it was not easy to divine-the meaning of what the prisoner had just said could not be plainer. Or bolder.

‘Simon,’ she said, ‘I would not ask you to say anything that was not true. Only to keep silent if the moment comes.’ She looked steadily into his eyes. ‘Will you do that for me?’

In a dazed voice he answered, ‘I do not know that I have your strength, Miriam.’

‘You are a man!’ she said again. ‘For me, you will be strong.’

He continued to look at her without saying anything.

‘Go now,’ she told him gently.

He nodded.

The prisoner’s face resumed its look of passivity, as if nothing more needed to be said.

Bell felt for the keys on her belt.

The governor cleared his throat. ‘You are, em, keeping well?’

‘Fit for work, sir,’ James Berry answered.

‘Very good. Let me see. When was it we last-’

‘April, sir. Mason, the Stepney murderer.’

‘So it was,’ confirmed the governor with a sigh. Small talk with the hangman was a cheerless business. ‘Is, em, everything in order for Monday?’

Berry confirmed that it was. ‘I spent an hour in the execution shed this morning. Everything’s greased, sir. The traps drop nice and clean.’

The governor nodded indulgently. Berry liked it to be known that he had checked the mechanism of the gallows. An unhappy episode in Exeter Gaol three years before, when the trap-doors had three times failed to operate, had left him sensitive to criticism. ‘You have the prisoner’s weight and height from the records, I am sure. Has there been an opportunity …?’

‘Watched her at exercise this morning, sir. I see no problem. I take it the wardresses will see that the hair is pinned up. No reason to cut it.’

‘That will be attended to.’

‘Thank you, sir. And I assume I may visit the prisoner on Sunday evening, according to custom?’

‘If you wish. The husband will be asked to take his leave of her by seven. I suggest you choose a moment half an hour after that. There are other visitors to be fitted in-the clerk of St Sepulchre’s, the chaplain and myself, but you will not take long, I imagine.’

‘Fifteen minutes at most, sir. I like to give the prisoner some verses of a religious character to read, as you may recollect. My sister, sit and think, while yet on earth some hours are left to thee; kneel to thy God, who does not from thee shrink-’

‘Yes, yes. Admirable sentiments,’ said the governor. ‘You were good enough to provide me with a copy on a previous occasion. Berry, I think I should explain that this woman has already fully and freely confessed her guilt. It will not be necessary, or indeed appropriate, for you to inquire whether she wishes to make any statement about her crime. That is not to say, of course, that your exhortations to intransigent prisoners on previous occasions are unappreciated.’

‘Only two in my experience have gone without confessing,’ Berry remarked with a trace of pride.

‘Quite. And concerning the arrangements for Monday …?’

‘I should like breakfast at half past six, sir. My usual, if it can be arranged. I shall be in the shed until I hear the bell begin to toll at a quarter to eight. Then I shall walk up the passage and wait with the other parties who will form the procession. Punctually at three minutes to the hour I shall enter the cell and pinion the prisoner’s arms. From what I am told she is unlikely to resist.’

‘There will be seven male warders in attendance in case of difficulties,’ said the governor. ‘Two females will escort the prisoner in the procession, but at the scaffold steps they will step aside and allow two men to support her while you fasten the cap and the leg-strap.’

Berry gave a nod. ‘May I inquire who else will be present, sir?’

‘The chaplain, of course, the Under Sheriff and his two wandbearers, the surgeon and his assistant and two gentlemen from the press, making seventeen persons in all, apart from ourselves and the prisoner.’

‘Very good, sir. Just as long as they step out, I’ll have the job done as St Sepulchre’s strikes the hour.’

A four-wheeler drawn by a large grey threaded through the Strand in the direction of Ludgate Hill, its destination Newgate Prison. Chief Inspector Jowett, seated opposite Sergeant Cribb inside, had the strained look of a man who had slept fitfully, if at all. The evening before, he had seen the Commissioner to request an interview with Mrs Cromer in the condemned cell. Cribb had waited in the corridor outside, in case he was called in. He was not. After forty minutes Jowett had emerged looking ashen. His lips had been moving as if he was talking to himself. Ignoring Cribb, he had returned to his office and closed the door. Twenty minutes later a clerk had come out of Jowett’s office and told Cribb that the meeting in Newgate would take place next morning. Cribb was to report to the Yard at half past nine.

This morning Jowett was no more communicative. He had signalled Cribb’s arrival with no more than a grunt, then picked up his hat and walking-stick and headed for the street. It was Cribb who had told the cabman where to take them.

Cribb did not need telling what had passed between Jowett and the Commissioner. The suggestion that Howard Cromer could be the real murderer of Josiah Perceval would not have been well received. Jowett had gone to the Commissioner convinced that Cromer should be arrested. Far from praising Jowett’s detective work, Sir Charles Warren must have erupted. That peppery old campaigner must have seen the consequences bearing down like the Dervishes in full cry: the need to inform the Home Office that the woman was innocent; the law made a laughing-stock; the Queen obliged to sign a Royal Pardon with unseemly haste; questions in the House; cries of police ineptitude; calls for a resignation.

But he could not prevent them now from talking to Miriam Cromer. She alone could confirm what had really happened.

Cribb had got what he wanted.

Privately still some way short of an explanation of the murder, he had seen the necessity of convincing Jowett that Howard Cromer’s disappearance was as good as an admission of guilt. A hesitant Jowett would not have survived two minutes with Warren.

From the start, Cribb had known he would need to talk to Miriam Cromer himself. He needed to form an opinion of his own. Other people’s assessments had supplied only contradictions. ‘If you ask me what sets her apart from other women, it’s an absence of pity.’ ‘She, poor innocent, suffered alone.’ ‘She is one of those enviable females who can cast a spell over men. Not one of you is capable of seeing her as she really is.’ He had not been helped by them. They presented postures, like the photographs round the sitting room at Park Lodge.

Understand the woman, see her, hear her, and he would get to the truth. He would discover why she had confessed.

His thoughts returned to the starting-point of this inquiry: the picture showing Howard Cromer at Brighton wearing the key to the poison cabinet on his chain. Its purpose was plain: to raise a serious doubt about the confession. The question nobody had asked was who had sent it. Who of the people connected with the case could have realised the significance of the picture? Miriam herself? She was in prison, and could not have sent it. Howard? If he had sent it, he was deliberately implicating himself in the murder. Allingham? What motive could their solicitor and confidant have had for sending it?

Howard Cromer or Simon Allingham?

If Cromer had sent it in a fit of conscience, why had he waited till now to flee from justice?

His thoughts were interrupted by Jowett, who had recovered the power of speech. ‘Where are we?’

Cribb looked out. ‘The Old Bailey is coming up, sir.’

‘Sergeant, I have decided to entrust the interrogation of Mrs Cromer to you. Your acquaintance with the more trivial details of the case is necessarily fresher than mine. I shall be present and you may defer to me on matters of procedure, but I fancy this will resolve itself quite easily now that we know the truth.’

‘As you say, sir.’

The two detectives and the governor of Newgate walked stiffly through a low-roofed passage, the antipathy between them unconcealed.

‘I may say that this is unprecedented in my experience,’ Jowett remarked. ‘I have never spoken to a prisoner under sentence of death. Tell me, Governor, what is her state of mind? How is she bearing up?’

‘No better for this infliction, I assure you,’ the governor answered, signalling to a turnkey to unlock the oak door to the condemned wing. ‘My estimation when I saw her yesterday was that she was beginning to reconcile herself to her sentence. There was reason to hope she would face the end with dignity. God knows how this will leave her.’

‘Permit me to assure you that we have no intention of inflicting distress,’ said Jowett in a shocked tone. ‘Our purpose is to establish the truth. We should not be here if it were not in question. I venture to suggest that you would not wish to be a party to the execution of an innocent woman.’

‘She pleaded guilty and she was sentenced according to the law,’ said the governor flatly. ‘That should be the end of it. If prisoners understood that there was no possibility of a reprieve, our work in Newgate would be distinctly less onerous. This kind of intrusion can only undermine the authority of the law and those of us entrusted to carry it out.’

They were met by the wardress-in-charge, whose curtsey was an odd refinement in the setting. ‘The prisoner’s solicitor has gone in as you instructed, sir,’ she told the governor. ‘Begging your pardon, we found it impossible to fit chairs for all you gentlemen into the cell.’

‘No matter, Miss Stones,’ said the governor. ‘We do not expect to take long over this.’

The cell door stood open. The governor went in first, Jowett following. Cribb waited in the doorway while the others found positions against the wall. Two wardresses and Allingham were already inside, behind Miriam Cromer, who was the only one seated, watching the influx with interested eyes.

Cribb’s first impression was that she was smaller than her portrait had suggested. But by no means was she diminished in spirit. In the graceless prison clothes, white mob-cap tied under the chin, coarse blue jacket and skirt, she succeeded still in looking elegant. She was pale from ten weeks’ imprisonment, practically as colourless as the picture in Cribb’s pocket. Her skin had the pellucid look of wax, and she was quite still, except for her eyes. They glinted with something between curiosity and challenge. They were confident, undismayed and, to Cribb, disturbing.

The governor announced who they were without putting it in so social a form as an introduction. ‘And this is Mr Allingham, the prisoner’s solicitor,’ he added for their benefit.

Allingham glanced over some papers he was studying and gave the measured nod of a legal man. Here in his black pinstripe and stiff collar he would not care to be reminded of those pictures of picnics when his hand had stolen round his client’s waist.

‘Would you begin, Chief Inspector?’ said the governor.

Jowett cleared his throat. ‘My, er, assistant, Sergeant Cribb, is to put the questions.’

‘Then he had better take the stool.’

Cribb edged between them and sat opposite Miriam Cromer. It was like entering a prize-ring. The situation was inimical to his style of questioning. He liked to find a common footing with those he interviewed, put them at their ease. Small chance of that in this grim place surrounded by officials.

He tried to hold her gaze in a way that excluded everyone else. ‘You haven’t met me before, ma’am. I took no part in the original inquiry. I was brought in to take a look at the confession you made. There are certain small matters, details really, that have come to light since your conviction. We can’t square them with your account of things. No-one says you got it wrong. The mistake may be on our side. Must be.’ He chanced a smile. ‘Well, you’re not likely to have got it wrong, seeing that you admitted to the crime.’

Her eyes focused steadily on his, conveying nothing.

‘It’s a fair assumption,’ Cribb went on, compelled to provide his own comment. Already he could see this developing into a monologue. ‘Where would be the sense in twisting facts when you know you’ll end up in this place?’ The question was rhetorical, but he paused before saying, ‘I’d like to talk about that confession, if you don’t mind.’

‘I have a copy here,’ Allingham announced. He leaned forward and put it into her hand. She took it without turning to look at him.

‘I’m obliged to you,’ said Cribb, taking out his own copy from his pocket. ‘Ma’am, I want to ask you if you stand by everything you said in this document.’

She shaped her lips to answer, but Allingham spoke first. ‘Naturally she does. This is an affidavit sworn before a magistrate. I must caution you not to impute perjury to my client, Sergeant.’

Cribb did not shift his eyes from Miriam Cromer’s. ‘May I take it that you are prepared to answer questions, ma’am?’

She nodded.

He went on, ‘I want to make it plain that I’m not here to trap you. What would be the point of that? I don’t go in for trickery.’

She surprised him by saying, ‘You leave that to the other man.’

‘The other man?’ Cribb shook his head, uncertain of her meaning.

In a level voice she explained, ‘The one who pretends he is not a policeman at all. The bearded man with a scar. He was sent to interview my husband on the pretext of having his photograph taken.’

‘Ah. I heard about this person from Mr Allingham,’ said Cribb. ‘Believe me, I know nothing about him. He is not a police officer, whoever he is.’

She twitched her lips into something like a smile. ‘I don’t expect you to admit his existence. You wouldn’t, would you? If he is not a policeman how is it that I am practically certain I saw the same man watching me from a window while I was exercising here? Is it common practice to allow members of the public into Newgate to spy on condemned prisoners, or has this place unhinged my mind?’

Whatever had been going on, it made Cribb’s task infinitely harder. He turned to the governor, who reddened and gave a quick shrug.

Allingham said, ‘Unless this is of any consequence, I suggest we confine ourselves to the affidavit, as the officer proposed.’

She set her mouth in a sullen little line. ‘As you wish.’

Cribb resumed. This would achieve nothing unless he could win her confidence. He decided to gamble. He would let her know that suspicion had shifted away from her. ‘I’ll come to the point, ma’am. Shortly after your conviction, a communication from some unknown person was received at the Home Office. It was a scrap of paper cut from a photographic journal, a picture of your husband taken in Brighton on the day Josiah Perceval was killed. An arrow had been drawn on it in red ink. The arrow was pointing to the key Mr Cromer was wearing on his watch-chain. Inquiries established that it was one of the keys to the poison cabinet. The other was found on the body of the deceased. There’s our first problem: how could you have opened the cabinet if one key was with your husband in Brighton and the other in the pocket of the man you claimed to have murdered?’ He paused.

It was put more as a statement than a question, but he was interested to see how she reacted. From the way she held her expression, eyes steady, brows tilted a fraction, he was convinced she had learned nothing new. She was studying him.

‘My superiors asked me to investigate,’ Cribb went on. ‘I studied your confession. It’s a very lucid statement, if I may say so. You say on page four’-he leafed through his copy-‘“When Mr Perceval went out for lunch at one o’clock, I returned to the studio, unlocked the poison cabinet, found the bottle of potassium cyanide and poured about a third of the contents into the decanter of madeira. I then replaced the decanter in the chiffonier where it was kept with the others, and locked the cyanide bottle in the poison cabinet as before. Soon after, I went out …” One thing you omit to state’-Cribb looked up from the confession-‘is how you obtained the key.’

Allingham put a hand on Miriam Cromer’s arm. ‘Say nothing.’ Addressing Cribb, he said, ‘My client does not wish to add anything to the statement she has already volunteered.’

As if there had been no interruption, Cribb continued, ‘Naturally, I was obliged to check your husband’s movements on Monday, 12th March. I learned that he was not, as we had supposed, in Brighton that morning.’

Allingham cut in again. ‘I think I should point out that there is nothing in the statement suggesting what time of day Mr Cromer arrived in Brighton. Indeed, it would be impossible for Mrs Cromer to supply such information.’

Cribb persisted in addressing his remarks to Miriam Cromer. ‘When I spoke to your husband he seemed unwilling to specify which train he caught to Brighton. I learned that he had engaged to be there by half past two. The delivery of wine was at noon, was it not? On the face of it, he could have doctored the decanter himself before he left. I’ve checked Bradshaw. He could have left the house as late as 12.45 and still caught the fast to Brighton from Clapham Junction at 1.12.’

Allingham made a show of protest. ‘That’s an extraordinary suggestion, officer. If he were here-’

‘He’s not, sir. He left his house yesterday afternoon, carrying a case of clothes. We don’t know where he is.’

‘This is absurd,’ said Allingham. ‘You have no grounds for suggesting that Mr Cromer would have poisoned his own assistant. What possible reason could he have for doing such a thing?’

‘The reason Mrs Cromer provided in her confession,’ answered Cribb. ‘She was being blackmailed. Her reputation, and therefore the reputation of her husband, was at stake. It’s a motive that would serve for either of them.’

Cribb’s eyes had not left hers. She had listened composedly, the colour rising faintly in her face and staying there. She had not registered surprise at anything so far. He had the feeling he was speaking a part she already knew by heart.

It was time to change the lines a little. ‘The man who took those photographs of you and your friends was known as Julian Ducane.’

Her forehead creased.

‘Is this of any relevance?’ Allingham asked.

‘You should know, sir,’ Cribb said without looking at him. ‘He was your best friend.’ To Miriam Cromer he said, ‘And your husband, ma’am.’

Her lips parted and she shifted on the stool.

‘I’m right, am I not?’

After a second’s hesitation she nodded.

‘He didn’t tell me,’ said Cribb. ‘He told me a lot when I questioned him, but he didn’t admit he met you in Highgate. No, I had to find out that for myself.’

She was frowning. ‘How, exactly?’

‘From a photograph,’ Cribb answered. ‘A picnic on the Heath. You were in it, of course, and your friends, Judith and Lottie. Mr Allingham, too.’

She fingered the strings of the prison-cap.

‘It puts a different construction on things, you must admit,’ said Cribb. ‘Mr Allingham’s presence in the picture suggested a link with Mr Cromer, which I was able to confirm later. I confirmed as well that in those days Mr Cromer was known as Julian Ducane, the man who took those unfortunate photographs of you and your two friends. The pictures were taken by the man you later married. Unhappily for you they fell into the hands of Josiah Perceval. He told you he acquired them in Holywell Street. From my inquiries I suspect he mentioned that notorious place to shock you. It’s more likely that he chanced upon them in some photographic dealer’s where your husband had disposed of some of his old stock-but that’s unimportant. The strange thing is that when Perceval produced the pictures and threatened you with blackmail, you said nothing to your husband. It was no secret, surely? You could have confided in him without shame or fear.’

She shrugged, trying to seem indifferent, but there was concern in the blue eyes.

‘It’s a problem,’ said Cribb, as if the worry were all on his side. ‘You made a number of payments to Perceval over a period of four months. You visited a pawnbroker, put your jewellery in hock. It’s evident that you hadn’t spoken to your husband about it. I’m bound to wonder why.’

‘She made the reason perfectly clear in her affidavit,’ said Allingham. ‘It could serve no practical purpose except to extend the blackmail to Howard. He is highly-strung, an impulsive man-’

‘I’m aware of that, sir,’ Cribb said to cut him short. ‘What I’m coming to, ma’am, is that it wasn’t just the photographs that you believed would alarm your husband. It was the connection with West Hampstead. Something had happened there, something that caused him to shut down his studio and go to Kew with a different name.’ He paused, watching her, hearing her breath quicken. ‘Judith Honeycutt’s death from cyanide poisoning.’

‘There was an inquest,’ she said at once. ‘Judith committed suicide.’

Cribb waited. Her reaction now would be crucial.

She turned to look towards Allingham. Ripples of tension had formed in her cheeks.

Allingham slipped his hand on her arm, but said nothing.

‘One thing was not made clear at the inquest,’ said Cribb. ‘The coroner was not informed that Judith Honeycutt was engaged to be married to Julian Ducane.’

‘What?’ Allingham said in a gasp. He withdrew his hand from Miriam’s arm.

‘It was never official,’ she said immediately, more to him than Cribb. ‘There was no ring. For that matter,’ she added, facing Cribb again, ‘how can you know?’

‘The day before Judith died, she met Miss Lottie Piper.’

‘Lottie?’ she said in amazement. ‘Lottie has spoken to you?’

‘Yesterday.’

Her voice changed. It took on a harder resonance. ‘Lottie never liked me. She was absurdly jealous. Do you know why? Because Howard chose me as his model.’ She emphasised it by pressing her hand to her chest. ‘I was the one he wanted to photograph. He wanted me, not Lottie or Judith. Simon, tell him that is true.’

Before Allingham could speak, Cribb said, ‘Judith was expecting a child.’

She looked at Cribb and said slowly, spacing her words. ‘And Howard poisoned her.’

‘Miriam!’ Allingham barked her name.

‘Why deny it now?’ she demanded. ‘The girl was a slut, no better than the creatures on the streets. Worse, because her price included marriage as well as money. Howard allowed himself to be trapped.’

‘I suggest you say no more,’ Allingham urged.

‘If I don’t speak now, I shall be hanged, Simon. God knows, I have kept silent all this time.’

‘This isn’t the way,’ said Allingham through his teeth.

She hesitated. Cribb watched her twist her fingers into the fabric of her skirt. Whatever Allingham advised, the impulse to talk was too strong to resist.

With an effort to keep her speech slow, she said, ‘No one can accuse me of disloyalty to my husband. He has condemned himself by running away. You said just now that the motive for murdering Perceval could be attributed to Howard as much as me. You were right. His reputation was at risk, his studio.’ She paused, her eyes ransacking Cribb’s. ‘It was not the photographs of three deluded girls in their skins that caused him to panic. It was the knowledge that Perceval had traced the pictures to Hampstead. Howard lived in dread of his past being uncovered. His nightmare was that someone would discover the real circumstances of Judith’s death. When I told him Perceval intended going to Hampstead to try to trace the plates of those photographs, he was seized with fright. He was certain it would raise questions that had never been asked about Judith and himself. He believed his arrest for the murder of Judith would be inevitable if he did not act. So instead of travelling to Brighton that Monday morning, he remained at Park Lodge and put poison in the decanter. My husband is the murderer of Josiah Perceval. I am innocent.’ She drew back on her stool and widened her glance to take in everyone in the cell. ‘Do you understand? You have condemned an innocent woman to die!’

Cribb’s eyes switched to Allingham. The young solicitor was deathly pale and beads of sweat were forming on his forehead.

‘Do you have anything to say, sir?’

‘Say?’ Allingham shook his head.

‘As Mr Cromer’s solicitor,’ Cribb prompted him.

Miriam swung round to Allingham. ‘Simon, you must tell him. Howard is guilty. You must confirm it.’

Allingham’s discomfiture was written on his features. ‘My dear, I cannot do that,’ he told her in a low voice.

‘Simon!’

He looked away.

‘Simon, for me. For us.’ She snatched at his hand. One of the wardresses moved to restrain her. ‘Leave me alone!’ she blurted, close to hysteria. ‘Simon, won’t you save me?’

Averting his eyes, Allingham said tonelessly to Cribb, ‘On the morning of 12th March, Howard Cromer was with me in my chambers here in London. He came to consult me about the blackmail, which Miriam had confided to him at the weekend. He was with me from half past eleven to just before one, when he left for Victoria, to catch the train to Brighton. My clerk will confirm this.’

‘No!’ cried Miriam. ‘It isn’t true!’ She turned back to Cribb. ‘Don’t believe him! They want me to die, both of them. They plotted this between them. Can’t you understand? They made me confess so that Howard should escape. They promised I should be pardoned. They promised!’

Cribb nodded to subdue her. ‘That I believe, ma’am. You expected to be pardoned.’

He looked into the pale, attentive face. It was no longer the face in the photograph. The delicate balance of probabilities had shifted. It was beautiful, but it held no mystery. It was the face of a murderess. She was guilty not of one murder, but two. And ready to kill again. She wanted Howard Cromer to hang.

Cribb saw in her eyes an implacable force: the strength of her will. It was a force that in other circumstances might have made Miriam Cromer a social crusader of her time, for it refused to recognise defeat. But events had turned it inwards. It had become an impulse to self-gratification. She had coveted marriage. She would not be thwarted. She had murdered her own friend. Marriage had brought frustration, not fulfilment. She had discovered what it was to be the object of someone else’s obsession. Isolated and unloved, yet treated with devoted kindness, she had concentrated her will into playing the part of a wife. When blackmail had intervened, she had expunged it ruthlessly. The trial and sentence had provided a fresh challenge for her strength of purpose. She had come within an ace of cheating the hangman.

Oddly, he felt a measure of respect for her. He did not want this to end in an undignified scene.

‘You were cleverly advised,’ he told her. ‘Considering the evidence against you, it’s a marvel that you had us in two minds about your guilt.’

She looked at him through smouldering eyes, trying to read his face.

‘You should have heeded Mr Allingham’s advice,’ Cribb continued. ‘Said nothing, left us to draw conclusions. Mr Allingham would not have told us your husband had an alibi until you were pardoned. But you forced it from him by accusing your husband of murder. You wanted too much out of this-a pardon and your husband’s conviction. A charge of murder against your husband would never stick, and Mr Allingham knows it. The purpose of the plan was to raise enough doubts to secure your release.’

‘The doubts have not all been removed,’ she said with iron control. ‘You seem to forget that if Howard was with Simon, as he claims, then travelled straight to Brighton, I could not possibly have unlocked the poison cabinet, since I did not possess a key.’

Cribb nodded tolerantly. ‘That’s a puzzle that exercised me a lot, ma’am. There’s only one conclusion possible, and that is that you used Josiah Perceval’s key.’

With an air of mockery, she said, ‘I am supposed to have asked him for it, am I? And he, a blackmailer, meekly handed me the means of his destruction? You had better improve on that.’

‘That is what happened in effect,’ said Cribb, ‘except that it was not the poison cabinet you said you wanted to unlock. It was the chiffonier where the decanters were kept. That was kept locked. Your husband being out when it was time for you to attend to the wine, you must have borrowed Perceval’s key to open it. An innocent-sounding request which he was unlikely to refuse, seeing that he was partial to madeira. Perceval’s keys were on a ring. On that ring was also the key to the poison cabinet.’

‘I returned the keys to him after unlocking the chiffonier,’ she pointed out.

‘Without the key to the cabinet, which you had slipped off the ring,’ said Cribb. ‘At lunchtime, when Perceval was out, you obtained the cyanide and put some in the decanter.’

‘If that is true,’ she persisted, ‘how do you explain that the key of the poison cabinet was found on the key-ring in Perceval’s pocket after he was dead?’

‘When you returned to Park Lodge and found the doctor there and Perceval dead, you still had the key in your possession. The doctor asked to look in the cabinet. If you had simply produced the key, it would obviously have looked suspicious. You were clever enough to tell him that the keys were in Perceval’s pocket. He removed them and handed them to you to open the cabinet. You held them in your palm in such a way that the loose key appeared to be attached to the ring as you turned the lock. While the doctor was examining the poison bottles, you covertly re-attached the key to the ring. The doctor himself returned the bunch to the dead man’s pocket, where it was found when the police arrived.’ Cribb brought his hands together. ‘I don’t suggest you acted as you did to incriminate your husband. At the time, you were interested only in contriving the appearance of a suicide. When that became impossible, the other plan was worked out.’ He shot a glance at Allingham. ‘A gamble, that was, but a calculated one. And infernally clever. There is not a single detail I can fault in that confession. It happened just as you described it, ma’am. There were things you didn’t go into, but the law can’t touch you for something you don’t say. No, if the strategy had worked, and you had got your pardon, we couldn’t have brought a charge of perjury later, not for one syllable of that confession. It was absolutely true.’ He folded his copy and replaced it in his pocket. ‘Thank you, ma’am, for hearing me out.’

Miriam Cromer for a moment stared expressionlessly at Cribb. Then she said in a low voice, ‘You had better leave me, all of you.’

The governor, forgotten, touched Cribb’s shoulder. By a consensus of looks it was agreed to go.

Allingham injudiciously lingered. ‘Miriam-’

‘Get out!’ she said in a spasm of anger. ‘Stay away from here!’ She wrenched at her finger and flung her wedding-ring at him. ‘And tell him to stay away. Get out, get out, get out!’

For the return to Scotland Yard, Jowett and Cribb sat in uncomfortable proximity in a hansom.

‘It flies in the face of protocol,’ Jowett remarked, ‘but I think it might be diplomatic to go to the Commissioner’s club at once to make a verbal report on this affair. He said he would stay in London for the weekend in case of developments. I can disabuse him now of the notion that Miriam Cromer is innocent.’

‘Is that what he believes, sir?’ Cribb mildly asked.

Jowett turned abruptly to look at him. ‘That was the advice I tendered yesterday evening, after my conversation with you. He was not at all pleased to hear it. Some of the things he said were simply sulphurous.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘By Jove, Cribb, if I thought you sent me in to see him with intent to mislead-’

‘Not at all, sir. You drew your own conclusions from the information we had at the time.’

‘Hmm.’ Jowett stared thoughtfully at the shoppers along the Strand. Presently he gave a slightly embarrassed cough into his hand and said, ‘It is not impossible that the Commissioner may be extremely relieved by what I have to tell him. He may express an interest in meeting you.’

‘Should I accompany you to his club, sir?’

‘I think not,’ Jowett answered at once. ‘I shall give him only the briefest summary of our findings at this stage. I doubt if your name will come up. However, I shall assure Sir Charles that a full written report will follow in due course. We shall not need to hurry over that.’

No, thought Cribb. A report to the Commissioner would take at least a week of Jowett’s time. It would be polished into a model of penmanship, rational and cogent. All loose ends would be excised. And with them, the name of Cribb.

‘Now that we may speak freely,’ Jowett said, at his most amiable, ‘I should like to know your opinion of the husband in this case. The woman’s guilt is established beyond doubt. Merely out of curiosity, what construction do you put on Howard Cromer’s actions?’

Cribb was not deceived. Jowett was planning that report. In case charges of conspiracy were mooted, he wanted to be certain there was a case to be made.

He answered forthrightly, ‘I’ll give you my opinion, sir. Cromer and Allingham are guilty men, but they plotted this so cleverly that I can’t see the Director of Public Prosecutions taking it up. I believe it happened like this. The murder of Josiah Perceval was Miriam Cromer’s decision alone. During the weekend she had told her husband she was being blackmailed. How he took the news can only be guessed at, but his remedy was to discuss the matter with his solicitor, which he did that Monday, sacrificing his morning in Brighton. Miriam may have been dissatisfied with Howard’s remedy, or she may have decided to settle the matter in her own way on an impulse-when she had Perceval’s keys in her hand. She had the means of faking a suicide, and if you want the truth, I think she would have got away with it if the poison had acted as she expected. It didn’t, and ultimately even Inspector Waterlow could not escape the conclusion that he had a case of murder on his hands.’

Jowett clicked his tongue. ‘That’s an unnecessary slur on a fellow officer, Sergeant.’

Without altering his tone, Cribb said, ‘As it’s unnecessary, I withdraw it, sir. Once it became a murder inquiry, and the evidence of blackmail was uncovered, Miriam Cromer needed something quite remarkable to save her from the gallows. I believe Allingham set out to provide it. He knew the case against her was so damning that she was practically certain to be convicted. But if she confessed and pleaded guilty, capitulated, as it were, she might, on the contrary, be saved. It meant, you see, that she would be convicted on her own account of what happened, not the prosecution’s. This provided the opportunity of writing a confession that was true in everything it said, but left a vital piece of information unexplained.’

‘The business of the key,’ put in Jowett.

‘Yes, Allingham must have analysed the facts of the case and seized on this as the best chance of introducing an element of doubt. No one would mention it until after the trial. If it was brought to the Home Secretary’s attention, it would have to be investigated. The plan was to divert suspicion towards Howard Cromer. Circumstances made him the only alternative suspect, but circumstances had produced two bonuses: the picture in the Photographic Journal and the fact that Cromer was not in Brighton on the morning of the murder. The picture was sent to the Home Secretary. In due course, I was sent to see Cromer. He was evasive about his movements. He hedged about the train he caught to Brighton. They must have known we would check the minutes of the A.G.M. and discover he was absent in the morning. And they still had their trump to play.’

‘Cromer’s disappearance?’

Cribb nodded. ‘That was calculated to force us into action. With Howard on the run like a guilty man, we would need to consider extradition. The gamble was that in order to obtain a warrant, we would have to arrange a pardon for Miriam Cromer. As soon as she was pardoned Howard would surrender to the police. He would announce that he had an alibi for the morning of the murder, and Allingham would confirm it.’

‘But that would confirm his wife’s guilt,’ said Jowett.

Cribb had waited for this. ‘Autrefois Convict.’

‘I beg your pardon.’

‘Don’t you have French, sir? A legal expression. It dates back to common law. A person cannot be prosecuted twice for the same offence. Even if we knew Miriam Cromer was a murderess and brought her up before a magistrate, she could plead Autrefois Convict and walk out a free woman.’

‘I am aware of the law, Cribb,’ said Jowett sourly. ‘It was the terminology that escaped me.’

In case something else escaped the Chief Inspector, Cribb said, ‘It was a very cunning idea, sir, not easy to unravel. But like all ideas it depended on people to carry it out. Their nerves were tested to the limit. Miriam Cromer in the death-cell waiting for Howard to make his move. Howard, who had to tread the tightrope between supplying information and concealing it. Allingham, the architect of the plan, knowing either of the others could ruin it and destroy his career. Howard was the first to put a foot wrong. The unforeseen intervened, in the person of the bearded man they decided was a detective. I still don’t know who he was-probably never will. I was livid when I heard about him, but on consideration I have to admit he did us a good turn. Howard Cromer was so anxious for an indication that the police had taken his bait that he assumed this visitor was one of ours, instead of some morbidly-inclined member of the public. By inviting the man in, humouring him and taking his picture, he showed how desperate he was to interest the police in himself. And of course I heard of it from Allingham, who was no less interested to confirm whether the man was from the Yard. It was an instructive incident, and it need never have happened if Cromer had politely sent the man away. It made me think.’

‘I must say, I thought it suspicious myself.’

Cribb disregarded the contribution. ‘The next day Howard Cromer vanished.’

‘The trump card.’

‘I couldn’t ignore it,’ said Cribb. ‘I decided to make use of it myself-to secure the meeting with Miriam Cromer. She surprised me. I didn’t expect to be confronted by a woman so fully in command of herself. The only way I could see of getting at the truth was persuading her that we had swallowed the story and simply wanted evidence of Howard’s guilt. I thought she might become over-confident. That, as you know, is what happened. She wasn’t satisfied with the original plan. She had thought of an improvement. Instead of letting us draw our own conclusions as to Howard’s guilt, she proceeded to confirm them, and she expected Allingham, out of regard for her, to withhold the alibi. Then she would be pardoned; Howard would hang and she could begin a new life with Allingham, who had always admired her. She believed she could count on Allingham’s co-operation by convincing him that Howard had murdered Judith Honeycutt and so deserved to hang.’

‘For another murder?’ said Jowett. ‘That’s perverted logic, if ever I heard it.’

‘Ten weeks in custody had given her time to fashion the facts to suit her purpose,’ said Cribb. ‘She overreached herself. Allingham might have allowed emotion to over-rule his judgment until he heard what Lottie Piper had confided to me-that Howard had engaged to marry Judith Honeycutt. Nothing had been said at the inquest about that betrothal, nor had Allingham been told of it. He saw in a flash that Miriam had had the motive for murdering Judith: she had wanted Howard for herself.’

Jowett stared bolt-eyed at Cribb. ‘She murdered the Honeycutt girl as well?’

‘I’m sure of it. Proving it now would help nobody, but it’s the only explanation. Consider how she behaved under the threat of blackmail. For weeks she said nothing to her husband about her ordeal. She made her own arrangements to meet Perceval’s demands-and it’s no light matter for a woman of her class to enter a pawnshop. Yet why didn’t she take Howard into her confidence? He knew about the photographs: he was the photographer. If the danger were simply the threat of scandal to their livelihood it would have been natural for her to turn to him, but she didn’t. There was a greater danger that only Miriam Cromer understood. Imagine what Howard Cromer’s reaction would have been to the news that the wife he worshipped was threatened with blackmail by his assistant. He would have been outraged. To submit to a cheap threat of that sort was unthinkable. I believe he would have dismissed Perceval instantly from his employment and threatened him with prosecution. Howard, you see, could not appreciate the greater danger to his wife-that Perceval by chance had unearthed a link in the chain that led to Judith Honeycutt’s murder. It was safer, Miriam Cromer decided, to make the payments herself, buy the photographs and say nothing to Howard, who still believed Judith’s death was due to suicide. So that was what she did, until the fateful day when Perceval told her he was going to Hampstead to try to buy the plates. The thing she feared most was about to happen. Perceval would trace the name of Julian Ducane and very probably learn the story of Judith’s death. What Miriam had thought was buried was about to be disinterred. She decided to poison Perceval as she had poisoned Judith.’

‘So callous!’ Jowett exclaimed. He shook his head. ‘And such a fine-looking woman. A picture.’

‘A picture,’ Cribb repeated, thinking his own thoughts.

The cab turned left in Great Scotland Yard. ‘Sergeant, I salute you!’ Jowett said in a fit of generosity. ‘Between us, by Jove, we have saved the law from a contemptible plot. I shall put you down here. You may be sure that everything you have told me will be conveyed to the Commissioner. In my own words. Depend upon it, I shall omit nothing of importance.’

Cribb got out of the cab, touched his hat and made his way unimportantly home.