Murder on Charing Cross Road Read online

  “Morgrave is well informed on the Peninsular war. I would like to hear his views on that. It’s much discussed at the present.”

  “Very well. I’ll say that in my note. I’ll send it right after dinner.” She made fast work of her dinner and dashed off to her dressing room to write the invitation. The note was dispatched, with a mention that the footman would wait for the reply. An acceptance came back while they were having coffee in the rose salon. Then a footman was sent off to ask the others to come as soon as possible to discuss the change of plans.

  “I wonder if Black has proper evening clothes,” Corinne said.

  In her former home across the street, Black was much upset by the same consideration. He immediately darted across the street and asked for a word with Luten. “I’m gratified — honoured by your invitation,” he said, glancing from husband to wife. “To give you the truth with no bark on it, I haven’t the proper clothes for such a do. I was wondering — just an idea — if I might hang about as a sort of upper servant.”

  “Or a friend from the country, perhaps, who hadn’t planned to remain overnight,” Lady Luten suggested, as if it had just occurred to her.

  Luten added, “An accident with your carriage, you called on us and we insisted you stay here.”

  “That’s dandy then,” Black said, much relieved. Now that he was in the Brigade he must get a proper suit made up for evening.

  Prance and Coffen arrived hot on his heels and the group were primed as to their duty. Prance’s fastidious sense of propriety revolted at such a low stunt, until he remembered he was now a dangerous spy, up to any foul trick, at which time he said, “A dashed clever idea, Luten.”

  Coffen, ever practical, said, “It’d help if we could get him bosky.” It was agreed that wine would flow freely in Morgrave’s direction.

  The Morgraves arrived shortly before nine and the necessary introductions were made. The Morgraves did not seem to find it odd that Black was of the party. He remained mostly mute, but didn’t miss a word that was said, despite the free flow of wine. Corinne soon took Samantha upstairs to show her the gown she had made up for the big ball.

  Prance said to Morgrave, “I’ve seen you at Arthur’s a few times lately, Morgrave. Is it your favorite club?”

  “I like it. I should warn you, though, you want to take your purse with you when you hang up your coat. I was told they’ve had trouble with one of the employees there pilfering things from gentlemen’s pockets. In fact, they caught him at it and let him go.”

  “Just taking things, was he?” Coffen said.

  Morgrave laughed. “He’d hardly put things into their pockets, now would he?”

  “You never know,” Coffen replied.

  “So they caught the fellow who was doing the pinching,” Prance said in a casual tone. “Who was it?”

  “It was a French fellow they’d hired recently. He was supposed to be working in the kitchen but sneaked upstairs when no one was watching him. Henri something. Moreau, I think.”

  Coffen managed to stifle the gasp that he felt rising at this name. “I hope you didn’t have anything stolen?” he said.

  “Oh he’d not get much from my purse. I always carry it with me in any case. I was there the day they caught him at it, though. Well, so were you. It was the first time I met you there. I believe you had just left when old Crocker caught him dead to rights. Gave him his marching orders on the spot.”

  “Thankee for the warning. Do they have any more Frenchies working there?”

  “There were a couple of them. He let them both go. They were friends, and the manager was afraid they were both in on it. Better safe than sorry. A thing like that gives a club a black eye.”

  The conversation turned to the war and Morgrave expounded his views, bolstered by letters from his brother who was with Wellington in Spain, until the ladies joined them.

  When Morgrave produced a copy of Shadows on the Wall and asked Prance if he would mind signing it, Prance would have forgiven him any offence. Prance enjoyed fifteen minutes of showing off. It was difficult indeed not to reveal some hint of the book he was working on at the present when Samantha asked, but he managed to do it. He wanted to stun the reading public, take them completely by surprise.

  Luten told Morgrave about his Smoker being stolen — he did not explain exactly when or where this had taken place — and about his recovery. “It turns out the fellow who sold him is called Eric Martin. You’ve never heard of him?”

  He shook his head. “I haven’t. London is becoming a wicked place. Money stolen at Arthur’s, your mount stolen, Prance beaten and robbed. You never learned who it was that attacked you, Prance? Didn’t get back that purse you were describing to me?”

  “No, but I am taking your suggestion and having another one made up.”

  Tea was served and the little informal party broke up early. Morgrave, despite several glasses of wine, was not at all bosky. Samantha told the hostess they had had a lovely evening, and wasn’t it nice to just meet a few friends without the formality of having to wear a fancy gown and be jostled about for hours. They must do it again soon. Corinne was to accompany Samantha to her dressmaker to approve her gown for the Orphans’ Ball.

  “What happened while I was abovestairs?” Corinne demanded the minute the guests left. “You’re all looking as pleased as cats gorged on cream, and you weren’t asking any pertinent questions. You found out who planted the purse in Morgrave’s pocket.”

  “Yes, the mystery is solved, and we didn’t even have to quiz him. It was Henri,” Luten said, and filled her in on the details of the story. “The purse was obviously put in Morgrave’s pocket without his knowledge. I shouldn’t be surprised if it was removed the same day — the day Coffen discovered it there, since Morgrave had no knowledge of it.”

  “Henri must have seen me loitering about the coat rack,” Coffen said. “He knew what I was up to and planted the purse. As soon as he saw me find it, he sneaked back and took it away. But how did he know what I was looking for? It’s downright eerie, as if they can read our minds.”

  “They knew we suspected Morgrave,” Prance explained. “They would have discovered he frequented that club. Henri and his ami got the positions there in hope of finding some way to make him look guilty.”

  “Ami? “ Coffen said, staring. “You mean there’s a woman in on it?”

  “Not chère amie, Coffen. Just ami, with no e on the end.”

  Coffen puzzled over this, then said, “You mean just am? What the devil is that?”

  “It’s French,” Prance said with a weary sigh.

  “Eh?” They all ignored him.

  Luten said, “I expect Henri’s having the purse with him was a lucky break. If he hadn’t, he would have found something else incriminating to use, written a note or some such thing. They seem to know in advance every move we make. They either followed Black to Long Acre or spotted him there and arranged that he overhear their plans to meet at the little spinney there, where they overpowered us.”

  Black finally spoke up. “The question is, how did they twig to it so early on that we suspected Morgrave?”

  “They’ve been keeping a watch on us ever since Bolton gave Prance that message for me,” Luten said. “They searched him that night, broke into his house and when they didn’t find the message there, searched your house, Coffen. They must have been watching Bolton’s place the next morning when Coffen and I went there and found him dead. They followed us and noticed our sudden interest in Morgrave. They knew Morgrave was innocent and purposefully kept us busy suspecting him so we wouldn’t suspect them.”

  “Even to the point of using a man who resembles Morgrave physically?” Corinne said.

  “I daresay it was just a lucky chance that they had a man of the same general size,” Luten said. “The man could be English or French. He didn’t open his mouth during that set to at the spinney. We thought it was to hide that he was English, but perhaps it was to hide that he’s French.”

>   “My head’s spinning,” Coffen said. “What it boils down to is that we’re back where we started.”

  “At least we can stop wasting time by suspecting Morgrave,” Corinne said, rather smugly.

  “I’ll ask if Eric Martin had a French accent when I see Ned Sparks tomorrow,” Black said. “He didn’t mention it. Another thing we ought to do is keep an eye peeled to see if we can spot who’s watching us, since they seem to know every move we make.”

  “Yes,” Luten agreed, “we’ll use their own trick and follow them. And it won’t be easy in a busy city like London, with dozens of carriages and hackneys in the street, to say nothing of mounted riders and pedestrians of all sorts, from link-boys to footmen, even youngsters darting about. It may be a gang of dozens for all we know. And we mustn’t rule out women as well. Plenty of nursemaids and servant girls running about.”

  “So what do we do tomorrow?” Coffen asked.

  “I’m going to have a word with Townsend. Black’s going to visit Ned Sparks. Corinne is going to visit Samantha, which will give them the notion we still suspect Morgrave. And we all watch to see if we’re being followed!’

  Coffen shook his head sadly. “I can’t think of a thing to do but go about town and see if I can spot who’s following me.”

  Luten turned a questioning eye on Prance. “I’ll do the same as Coffen, unless you can think of something else?”

  “There might be something to learn about Henri and his friend at Arthur’s.”

  “I doubt it’ll be learned amongst the members. The kitchen is where we might learn something. I could go and pretend I’m looking for work,” Black volunteered. “I’d not take your black carriage, Luten, but just dress up plain and see if they need help. With the two Frenchies turned off, they must be short-handed.”

  “That would be a great help, Black. In fact, that takes precedence over the visit to Ned Sparks. It’s not likely Henri left his true address or supplied real references, but the other workers there might know something.”

  “We’ll meet here this evening?” Black asked.

  “Come as soon as you learn anything, if you do learn anything. If not, we’ll meet here before dinner.”

  “Come for dinner,” Corinne said. “We haven’t all had a dinner together for some time.” With a thought to Black’s problem, she added, “And don’t bother dressing. Heaven only knows what we might have to do later.”

  Black had always known she was perfect. He was in no doubt as to why she had asked them not to wear evening clothes. He determined that he would stop in and see Stultz before he went to enquire for a position at Arthur’s. Next time he was invited to dine chez Lord Luten, he would be prepared.

  “That was thoughtful,” Luten said to his wife after the others left. “Black is a great help to us. We really needed someone of his stamp who can handle jobs like this one at Arthur’s.”

  “You must find an excuse to give him some money, Luten. He’ll be ordering a new suit of clothes if I know anything.”

  “I rewarded him for recovering Smoker. He’s your employee. You could increase whatever pittance you’re paying him for watching your house.”

  “We must find a proper position for him. Black is wasted, just sitting in an empty house. It won’t be empty long either. Samantha knows a couple who are looking for a small house to rent.”

  “You like her, don’t you?”

  “Yes, much better than I liked my last friend, Lady Dunn, who planned to kill me.”

  “Until I came to your rescue,” he added. “Now don’t I deserve a reward for that?”

  “You got me. What more do you want?”

  “More of you,” he said, drawing her into his arms.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Luten duly paid his call on Townsend the next morning. This famous Bow Street Officer, renowned for taking more criminals than the rest of the force together, had little to tell him. His office, as usual, was so littered with papers and reports there was no place to sit down. Townsend sat behind a battered desk at the only chair that wasn’t covered in paper. He looked like a troll seated on a mushroom in a fairy tale. His flyaway white hair and poorly cut blue jacket detracted from his appearance, but not from his intelligence.

  “You’re looking at a happy man, Lord Luten,” he said with a grin. “I’ve just arrested the infamous Codey brothers. They’ve been coining guineas so good you couldn’t tell them from the real thing till they’d been assayed. I happened to have a little something I could hold over the head of the fellow they were peddling them to at Stop Hole Abbey. But you don’t care about that. You’ve come about young Bolton,” he said.

  “What can you tell me about his murder?”

  “I can’t tell you much, but I can tell you the lad had no unsavoury friends and no bad habits. Whatever got him killed had nothing to do with his personal life. Since the Berkeley bunch are on the case, I assumed his murder is not without national significance. In other words, he was working for Hopley. My conclusion is that the Frenchies got him. Am I right or am I right?”

  Luten answered with a question. “Did he have any dealings with the French element?”

  “None that anyone’s talking about. Now if your friends had seen fit to let me know they’d been beaten up and burgled when it happened, I might have got on to something. The trail is cold as charity now. It’s all part and parcel of the same case, is it?”

  “There appears to be a connection.”

  “Well, whatever young Bolton was up to, he kept it to himself. I discovered nothing. It’s treated as a closed case, murder by person or persons unknown. If I can be of help in your investigation in any other way, Luten, I am at your service, as usual. But don’t keep me in the dark next time.”

  “Thank you,” Luten said, and headed to the door.

  “I’ll look forward to hearing from you,” Townsend called after him.

  * * * *

  Black, while sitting silent at Luten’s impromptu party the previous evening, had noticed the jackets the gentlemen wore were different from the one he had ordered. Plainer looking, somehow, yet with more elegance. He didn’t like them half so well as the one Stultz was making up for him, but he wanted to be as much like the others as possible, and when he visited Stultz to order his new suit of evening clothes, he requested less padding in the shoulders, and not quite so pinched in the waist. “Now would it be possible at all to fix up the first one in the same way?”

  Stultz thought the man was mad, but as there was no hope of making him look like an out and outer, he allowed that he always left a generous seam allowance, and could give him another inch in the waist and cut back on the shoulder padding.

  “Now about them buttons,” Black continued. “Silver, I think, in place of brass, and not quite so big.”

  “If you didn’t want a Stultz jacket, you ought not to have come to Stultz,” was the reply. But as this unusual gentleman had actually paid a part of the price in advance, he decided to oblige him. He had unpaid bills dating back years for some of his wealthier clients. “I’ll take care of it,” he said, and Black left happy, to pay his call at Arthur’s.

  “You’ve come at an opportune time,” the manager, Cocker, said. “It happens I’m a trifle short handed at the moment. What sort of position were you looking for, and where were you working before? We don’t take on just anyone.”

  “I was chef for Lady Melvoir, in Bath. Perhaps you’ve heard of her,” Black replied with a sneer.

  “Do they have chefs in Bath?” Cocker answered in the same tone. “I have an excellent chef. What I need is someone to help cook with the simpler dishes.”

  It was the kitchen that Black wanted to penetrate. “I’ve done some simple cooking in my time,” he allowed. “A beefsteak, chops, a roasted chicken.”

  “Go and have a word with my chef,” he said, and directed Black to the kitchen.

  Black entered a large, busy, hot kitchen, redolent with the aroma of roasting meats and steam from coffee. A doze
n pots boiled on the stove, while three men in aprons rushed about, preparing vegetables, stirring the pots, and rattling dishes. A boy, not yet in his teens, was washing dishes at the sink.

  The chef, Mr. Malcolm, took a look at Black’s suit and general air of knowing what he was about and took an instant dislike to him. He preferred younger, more disreputable looking fellows who were glad to get the work and took their orders without question. Black, meanwhile, subjected Malcolm to a similar examination and knew they were ill-suited to work together.

  Malcolm badly needed an extra pair of hands, however, and said, “Let’s give it a try. We’ll be serving up lunch soon. You can take that joint of beef out of the oven and carve it up. We like it sliced not too thick, not too thin. Jerry here will find other jobs for you. You’ll want to take off your jacket and put on an apron.” The chef then proceeded to strut about the kitchen, lifting lids on simmering pots, adding a dash of salt or pepper, and berating his staff.

  “Welcome to hell’s kitchen,” Jerry said, when they had introduced themselves. He was a small, wiry fellow with the shattered remains of a few teeth that he showed in a ready grin. His head was wrapped in a tea towel to keep the perspiration out of his cabbage green eyes. “The work’s brutal, the hours long and the pay small. But the grub ain’t bad, and when his majesty takes his break, we nip into the wine cellar and reward ourselves.”

  “Why do you stay?” Black asked, hanging up his jacket and wrapping a white apron around his waist.

  “I like to eat, don’t I? Times is hard, Blackie. What brings you here?”

  “As you said, times are hard.” He was shown where to find the carving knife, where to carve the roast, where to find dishes. All the while Jerry kept up a patter of conversation.

  When Black deemed the time was right, he said, “I hear you had a couple of Frenchies working here.”

  Jerry didn’t inquire how he knew this. “We did, and I’m sorry to lose them, say what you like. They were good workers. Nobody could stir up a ragout like Henri.”