An Arrowood Mystery

‘Ah, there you are, Barnett,’ he said. He was tired, a defeated look on his face. His cheek glistened with damp. Noticing my shirt and britches wet and messed with river mud, his brow wrinkled.

‘You’d better go aboard and see what we just pulled out of the water,’ I said.

Usually he’d ask what was going on, but seeing my face so grim he simply turned and picked his way through the queues. I followed him aboard, then waited by the gangway while he disappeared into the saloon. I rested my hands on the rail, watching the crippled boy sat on his crate at the top of the embankment stairs as he picked up a coin with his foot and dropped it in his bag. He was some kind of contortionist, that was sure. The boy pickpocket in full mourning dress came along and started to talk to him. The little dipper slapped the cripple’s twisted arm. The beggar kicked out at him. They laughed like it was the best game in London.

After five minutes, the guvnor returned to my side of the boat. He looked at me, the colour gone from his face.

‘What the hell are we dealing with here, Norman?’

He listened careful as I told him about the night before, asking about everything, every little detail. I knew he would, and I’d tried to repeat as much of it back to myself so I wouldn’t forget. He didn’t try to explain why he’d left the day before, and I didn’t ask him what he’d been up to. That could wait.

‘There’s something more behind this, Barnett,’ he said. ‘Why would Polgreen commit three murders just to put Moon out of business? Easier to sink the boat.’

‘It’s a police case now, sir.’

He nodded, his eyes scanning the pier. Spotting Katie lounging in her wherry, he climbed down and approached her.

‘Have you been here all morning, ma’am?’ he asked.

‘On and off,’ she said sharpish. Her tattered purple hat was pulled low over her eyes. She looked bored.

‘Did you see anything unusual? Anyone suspicious?’

She shook her head. ‘Pier’s always packed at the weekend. I just let them get on with it.’

‘What about last night?’

She nodded at me. ‘Saw him get aboard. Saw the Moons leave.’

‘Did you see anyone else approach the boat?’

She shook her head. ‘I went home soon after.’

The piermaster was coming down from Swan Lane with two coppers. I led them up the gangway to the saloon, where Moon sat next to Suzie. When I’d answered his questions, the sergeant sent his constable off to find a detective.

‘You all stay in here while I inspect the boat,’ he told us, and for fifteen minutes we watched him through the window as he stood looking at the bodies, wandered up and down the deck, rested his arms on the balustrade and inspected London Bridge. Then he lit his pipe and sat on a bench, staring out over the water at the wharves and warehouses of Southwark. As he was inspecting it all, the young copper returned.

‘I’ve brought the detective, sir,’ we heard him say.

‘Good Christ,’ said the guvnor. ‘What the hell’s he doing here?’

In the saloon window had appeared Inspector Petleigh of the Southwark Police. There was a lot of history between the guvnor and him, some of it good, some of it bad. For the moment, what with the chance he was maybe the father of Ettie’s baby, he was one copper we took no pleasure in seeing.

The sergeant led him round to where the bodies lay on the bow. After they’d had a good look, Petleigh nodded, turned, and came into the saloon.

When he saw us, he groaned.

‘I knew it was you two,’ he said in his clipped, nervy voice. ‘As soon he told me there were private agents I knew it.’

I glared at him.

‘How’s your wife, Petleigh?’ demanded the guvnor. ‘Happy? Well fed?’

‘She’s fine, since you ask.’

‘Did you ever get that divorce you were talking about?’

‘I’m not here to talk about my marriage,’ snapped Petleigh, his cheeks colouring.

‘What the hell are you doing here? This isn’t your parish.’

‘I’ve been assigned to the City Police for a few months. Both of their detectives are out of action.’

‘Why the blazes do we always get you?’ exclaimed the guvnor, throwing his hands in the air. ‘We might as well give up now!’

Petleigh’s eyes narrowed. He stroked his neat, waxed moustache. ‘Control yourself, William. Now, tell me what you’re doing here. What case are you working on?’

The guvnor glared at him.

‘Well?’ demanded Petleigh.

Finally, the guvnor explained it to him. As he spoke, Petleigh wrote notes in a little blue book. When he’d finished, he looked at Moon.

‘So you think it’s this Polgreen chap, Captain?’

Moon blinked like he was startled by the question. Then his face darkened. He looked at Suzie.

‘Yes, sir,’ she said when it was clear her old man wasn’t about to speak.

‘D’you recognize the bodies, Captain?’ asked Petleigh.

Moon shook his head and sighed deep.

‘He’s in shock,’ said the guvnor.

‘Miss Moon?’ asked Petleigh, looking at her with his sly eyes.

‘No, sir.’

‘What about the children’s skulls, do they mean anything to you?’

It was hot in the saloon, and Petleigh seemed to have a kind of skin-coloured powder caked on his forehead. Little cracks were appearing in it, where wet came out and ran down to his eyebrows.

Suzie shook her head.

‘Captain Moon?’ asked Petleigh.

Moon was still as a statue for a moment, then he shook his head. He didn’t look up.

‘Dad?’ asked Suzie.

Again he shook his head.

‘The sergeant says the deckhand’s gone missing,’ said Petleigh, tapping his pencil on his teeth. ‘D’you have his address?’

Suzie gave it him. He wrote it down, then looked out at the pier. ‘Ah. The police surgeon’s here. Please remain inside until we’ve finished.’ He looked at the guvnor. ‘All of you.’

Arrowood waited a few moments while Petleigh showed the police surgeon the bodies. Then, having lit a cigar, he got up and went out on deck, watching as the doctor did his work. After a few minutes, he came back into the saloon.

‘Well, they didn’t die by drowning. Both women were stabbed in the belly and chest. The man has head injuries from a blunt instrument.’

The guvnor took Moon by the shoulder. ‘Captain. Listen to me.’

Moon didn’t seem to hear him.

‘Captain Moon!’ The guvnor gave him a shake.

At last Moon looked up.

‘What do those skulls mean to you, Captain?’

The black of Moon’s eyes shrunk, and for a moment there was hatred in his wind-burnt face.

‘Fourteen skulls. Tell me what they mean.’

Moon shook off the guvnor’s hands and stood, walking to the open door facing onto the pier. There he brought out his pipe, his hand shaking. Four times he broke his match trying to light it. In a howl of despair, he wrenched the pipe from his mouth and hurled it off the boat.

Petleigh stepped back into the saloon.

‘We’ve sent the constable for a cart,’ he said. ‘This is a police matter now, William. Find yourself another case. If I have further questions I’ll send for you.’

‘We’re still engaged by the Captain to find who’s been damaging the boat,’ said the guvnor. ‘You cannot object to that, surely?’

‘You’re off the case and that’s final. Now, please go ashore.’

The guvnor puffed furiously on his cigar as he glared at Petleigh. ‘Are you the father?’ he asked at last.

‘That what?’

‘The father! Don’t act dumb, Petleigh. Are you?’

‘The father of who?’

‘Just tell me.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘Ettie’s child! Are you?’

‘What d’you mean, Ettie’s child?’

For some time they glared at each other.

‘What child are you talking about?’ asked Petleigh again.

‘That’s the way you’re going to play it, is it?’

‘Oh, I can’t be bothered with this,’ said the inspector with a wave of his hand. ‘Get off the boat. Now!’

‘Ettie’s well,’ said the guvnor. ‘Fine and healthy the both of them, Inspector, in case you were wondering.’

Petleigh blinked. He touched his moustache. His face loosened.

‘That’s good,’ he said, and stamped back out on deck.

Chapter Ten

We walked down Lower Thames Street, through the mayhem of porters and wagons outside Billingsgate, past Custom House and around the great grey walls of the Tower, the guvnor wheezing and complaining about his feet all the way. After the bridge, we wound our way through St Katherine’s Dock and over the basin lock. The deeper we went into Wapping, the darker it became, the high walls of the dockyards rising over the slouching buildings, shutting out the sun. As we marched down the busy high street lined with provisions shops, ship chandlers, missions and pubs, we could hear languages from all the continents of the world. I’d spent a lot of time in these streets when I was sixteen or seventeen, trying to earn a crust when my ma was laid up at home. It was a seafaring neighbourhood, and money ran through its calloused hands like water. Money I’d do just about anything to get my own hands on.

Belasco’s home was on a dirt alley behind the High Street, two doors down from a pub where red-faced Russians stood sweating and swearing on the street. It wasn’t such a well-off alley but not a slum either. Kids were everywhere, hanging out windows, sitting on doorsteps, running up and down after a ball of paper and string. A few old folk sat on stools, watching the nippers. Through the windows you could see women working: sewing collars and sacks, pressing clothes, gluing matchboxes, boiling up shrimp and sheep’s trotters.

The door to Belasco’s building was open. Inside, the corridor was dark, the floorboards bare and dusty. Just past the staircase was another door, also open, and there was Belasco, asleep on a mattress on the floor.

We walked in. He had a poultice tied to his head with a bit of rag, dried blood crusted round his ear. His thick brown hair was hard and stuck together.

‘What d’you want?’ asked a woman coming out from the gloom at the back of the room.

She was maybe ten year older than Belasco, with a growth on the side of her chin and a hard look in her eye.

‘Mrs Belasco?’ said the guvnor. He gave a bow. ‘I’m Mr Arrowood. This is Mr Barnett. We’re here to see your husband.’

She nodded, the hardness in her face turning into a smile.

‘I heard of you.’

‘Your husband didn’t arrive for work last night. We were worried.’

‘And you can see why,’ she said with a nod. ‘Got clouted, didn’t he?’

Belasco slept on.

‘When?’ asked the guvnor.

‘On his way home yesterday afternoon. Been drinking, of course. Mate of his brung him back. Didn’t Captain Moon get my message?’

‘No, ma’am,’ I said.

‘I sent a boy. Paid the bloody rascal.’

I dropped to my knee and gave Belasco a poke. He grunted, so I poked him harder. ‘Wake up, mate.’

His eyes opened. It took him a few moments to see straight, then he raised himself on an elbow.

‘Norman. Mr Arrowood.’

‘What happened to you?’ I asked.

He sat up proper, leaning his back against the wall. I could see one of his arms was bruised and swollen. He felt the bandage on his head, wincing.

‘Blimey, that hurts.’

I pulled out my box of Black Drop and tossed it to him.

‘Cheers, Norman,’ he said, dropping a few of the pellets in his mouth and swallowing. He spoke slow. ‘I was just leaving the pub. Some bloke come up behind and coshed me.’

‘What did he look like?’

‘Didn’t see him. I was out like a lamp. Lucky my mate came out else I don’t know what else the bloke would’ve done. He ran off, anyways.’

‘Did your friend see him?’

‘Only from behind.’ Belasco shook his head. ‘Bughunters. They work the area. I’d had a few mugs of gin. Weren’t too steady on my feet.’

Mrs Belasco brought over four mugs of tea and handed them round. There were only two chairs. A little table was piled high with lengths of cotton and half-made shirts. Another straw mattress was leant against the wall.

‘Something else happened to the boat last night,’ said the guvnor, having a swallow of his tea. ‘Someone tied two ropes to the gunwale. One had children’s skulls knotted on.’

‘What?’ asked Belasco.

‘Children’s skulls. Fourteen.’

Belasco shook his head, his face pale. His wife stared at the guvnor, her mug of tea frozen in the air just before her open mouth.

‘The other rope was tied to three corpses. Two women and a man.’

‘Come off it, Mr Arrowood.’

‘The police are there now,’ said the guvnor.

Belasco looked at him for some time. Several times he seemed about to say something, but each time he didn’t. Finally, he asked, ‘Suzie didn’t see it, did she?’

‘She saw everything.’

‘So it’s murder now,’ said Belasco, pushing himself to his feet. ‘Jesus bloody Christ.’ He found his britches and pulled them on. Seeing him struggle with only one good arm, his wife went over to help him.

‘The skulls must mean something,’ said the guvnor. ‘Can you remember anything you’ve seen, anything you’ve heard? It doesn’t matter how obscure. Something the captain might have said. Or Suzie.’

Belasco shook his head. ‘It don’t make sense. Lord, they must be out of their minds about it. Where are they? Still on the boat?’

‘Yes,’ said the guvnor, slurping his tea. ‘The police want to speak to you.’

‘’Course.’ Belasco took his shirt from the floor. ‘I’ll go now.’

‘You ain’t well enough,’ said his wife.

‘Captain needs me.’

‘Wait a moment, my friend,’ said the guvnor. ‘There’s more to this than just driving the Gravesend Queen out of business. If it is Polgreen then there’s something else behind it, something more personal. He wouldn’t risk being hanged just to gain the Gravesend run for himself. Can you remember anybody who might have a feud with the captain? Anyone at all?’

Belasco stuck his feet in his boots and bent to do up the laces. ‘I been thinking about it since this thing started, but there’s nobody. He talks away with me and Suzie when he’s not blue, but he keeps his distance from just about everyone else. Most folk don’t even notice him.’

‘What d’you know of his life before he took you on?’

‘He never talks about it. I only know about his wife and kids from Suzie.’

‘Did you ever ask him?’

‘Few times, but he don’t like to look back, he says. I know he had another steamer, but that’s all.’

‘The name?’

‘I don’t know.’ As he talked, Belasco struggled to get his swollen arm into his greasy shirt. His wife helped him get it on, tuck it in. He picked up some coins from the table, spooned a bit of porridge in his mouth. ‘Don’t even know the route. I did ask him but he always says the past’s the past.’

‘What about his friends?’ asked the guvnor. ‘D’you know any?’

‘There’s a fellow in Gravesend he sees when we’re waiting for the return trip. Has his dinner with him. Curtis. Lives somewhere near the high street.’

The guvnor scribbled it in his notebook.

‘Any others?’

‘I never heard him mention anyone else.’ Something came over him as he spoke and his eyes did a flutter. He clutched the doorframe. I got up to help him, leading him to my chair where he sat heavily, holding his head in his hands.

‘What is it, darling?’ asked his wife, laying her palm on his back.

‘Just come over dizzy,’ he mumbled. Then, real quick, he reached for the chamber pot and spewed up the tea he’d just swallowed. Then came another spurt of a different colour.

Mrs Belasco gave him a rag for his mouth. ‘You’d better stay home today, mate.’

Belasco shook his head. Holding the back of the chair, he rose slowly. ‘I’m all right now. Must’ve needed to get that out.’ He leant over and kissed her.

‘You be careful,’ she said.

‘’Course,’ he said. ‘I’ve got the detectives with me, ain’t I?’

Chapter Eleven

It was midday when we got back to the pier. On the boat, we found the Moons still sitting in the saloon, while Petleigh and the constable waited on deck, guarding the bodies against the gulls circling above. Belasco strode over to Suzie and gripped her arms.

‘Suzie,’ he murmured.

Her eyes glazed like tears were about to come. They didn’t. She pulled away.

‘Where was you?’ she asked sharply.

He pointed to the grey bandage on his head. ‘Got knocked out last night. Don’t know who by.’

‘You was drinking.’

Belasco looked at Moon, who sat staring out the window. ‘How is he?’

‘He won’t talk. His nerves is gone.’

Petleigh poked his head through the door. ‘Are you Mr Belasco?’ he asked.

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Could you come over here and look at the bodies?’

We followed Belasco onto the deck, where the three corpses had been laid out on their backs. A seagull stood on the smaller woman’s arm, trying to pull out a little purple sweetbread from the wound in her belly. Petleigh yelled and clapped his hands. Vexed, the gull beat its monstrous wings and rose, hovering above the bodies and shrieking back at the copper. Then, in an instant, it twisted and shot off across the river.

The guvnor turned away, his belcher to his mouth. The tall woman still had the bit of rope round her ankle where she’d been tied to the other one. Her bloody eyes, dried out in the sun, stared dully into the blue like week-old herring. Over the deck spread her tangled hair, run through with sticks and straw, knotted with bits of black river grease. They’d closed her nightdress over her belly, giving her a bit of dignity. The guvnor coughed, then turned back. Next to the big one the little one was laid out, her undershirt ripped almost in half. This hadn’t been arranged for her modesty, and we could see her belly torn open, the ragged purple muscle and pipes washed clean of blood by the river and now baking in the summer heat. Her innards seemed to be full of animal parts, sheep’s ballocks and pigs’ livers and bits of calves’ brains. On the deck next to her lay the sweetbread the gull had been trying to pull out, a spleen or something, a thin blue tube leading back inside her. Her hands were open on the deck, the palms facing the sun and one finger sticking up queer like a prick. Her head twisted towards the other woman, her starry eyes bright, her lashes glinting with river salt.

Next to her the man lay on his back. His head was clean-shaven, smooth and yellow like he was made of butter, spoiled only by the ragged wounds where his ears should be.

‘They call those butcher’s earmuffs in the criminal world,’ said Petleigh.

A long shirt covered the dead man down to his thighs; below that he was bare. Petleigh nudged a baby eel twitching on the floor next to him.

‘We pulled that out of his backside.’

The guvnor flitched.

‘D’you know these people, Mr Belasco?’ he asked.

‘No, Inspector.’

‘Customers?’

‘Can’t remember ever seeing them.’

‘Acquaintances of Captain Moon?’

‘No, sir.’

‘What did the surgeon say about the skulls?’ asked Arrowood.

‘Children, all different ages, died anywhere between five and a hundred years ago, he thinks.’ Petleigh brought out his snuff box and had a toot. His eyes watered. He sneezed. ‘Dug up from somewhere. Though why anyone would do that I do not know.’

‘It’s a message, for goodness’ sake,’ snapped the guvnor. ‘A child could’ve worked that out.’

‘I know it’s a damn message, William.’

‘It didn’t sound like it.’

‘Why are you so short-tempered today? Haven’t you been sleeping well?’

The guvnor glared at Petleigh: it seemed like the inspector was provoking him.

‘I’m short-tempered because we’ve just discovered fourteen children’s skulls and three corpses,’ said the guvnor through clenched teeth, ‘and this family are being ruined by somebody. My Lord, you’re a cold fish, Petleigh. Where’s your damn heart?’

‘I keep it at home when I’m called to a murder. Otherwise I couldn’t do this—’

‘At home!’ barked the guvnor, stiffening. His damp brow drew down over his eyes, his swollen nose flushed with blood. ‘With your wife who you told us you were divorcing?’

I took the guvnor’s arm to calm him. ‘What will you do now, Inspector?’ I asked.

Petleigh continued to hold the guvnor’s eye. ‘Investigations, Norman.’ He turned to Belasco. ‘I need you to come to the station, sir. I understand this is the first time you’ve ever deserted the boat.’

‘I got coshed last night,’ protested Belasco, pointing at the bandage on his head. His eyes were still on the bodies. ‘Knocked out cold.’

‘Fetch the captain too. His nerves have the better of him at the moment, but he’s going to have to start talking soon.’

‘You want Suzie?’

Petleigh looked at her through the saloon window. He shook his head. ‘I’ve already spoken to her.’

Belasco helped Moon up, then climbed off the boat with Petleigh. Arrowood fell onto a bench, his red face throbbing with heat and vexation. He pulled off his boots with a gasp, and we sat there with Suzie until the police wagon arrived, then watched as the coppers packed the ropes and skulls in canvas bags and carried away the bodies on three battered old gurneys. A crowd had gathered to watch, packed onto the pier and the Swan Stairs.

Suzie had one more look round, then locked the saloon, the wheelroom, the engine. She pulled on a simple brown bonnet and tied it under her chin. The piermaster stood by the gangway waiting for us.

‘Terrible business, Suzie,’ he said, a briar pipe hanging from his lips. Behind him, the crowd was following the coppers off the pier and up toward Thames Street. ‘But they oughtn’t to have left the boat here. I’ll need this space later.’

‘Sorry, Mr Wellersby,’ she said. ‘I’d have moved her if he’d let me.’

‘Not your fault, my dear. And can you tell your father the fees are overdue?’

Suzie nodded, a great sigh drifting from her pale lips. I didn’t think her grim face could have got any grimmer.

‘You need anything?’ asked the old fellow.

‘A bit of luck is all.’

He shoved his hands in his pockets. ‘You get some rest. I’ll watch over her.’

We walked with Suzie to the bus stop by the Monument.

‘D’you have any idea who those people might be?’ asked the guvnor as we waited.

‘No, sir. I never seen them.’

‘The skulls were a message, and I think your father knows what they mean.’

She spun round, her eyes fierce. ‘No, he don’t! He’d have said if he did.’

‘But he hasn’t spoken more than a few words since Norman pulled them up, Suzie. Something’s shaken him.’

‘’Course he’s shaken! Someone’s killed those people. ’Course he’s blooming shaken up – his nerves is gone!’

‘But yours haven’t. Norman’s haven’t. Your father’s been sitting there since this morning looking into the distance, his mind closed in on itself. That’s what people do when they’re remembering something difficult. What could it be, Suzie?’

Her brow was drawn low, her lips tight. ‘Go after Polgreen,’ she said.

‘Was he being threatened by creditors?’

‘We owed a bit, but they wouldn’t do this, would they?’

‘Did your father tell you of any other trouble he’s had? Now or in the past?’

‘He don’t talk about his past. Never has done. Ma didn’t neither.’

‘What about his work? Did he tell you about what he did before the Gravesend Queen?’

‘No, he never talks about it.’

‘Didn’t you ever ask?’

‘Don’t keep going on with the same question, Mr Arrowood. I don’t know, but you got to see Polgreen again. He’ll be back about seven tonight. It’s him that’s behind it. He’s a bad heart. A nasty and evil heart.’

The bus arrived and we watched Suzie as she was swallowed by the press of people climbing aboard.