The Masters of Bow Street (41 page)

‘One more question,’ James pleaded. ‘How many of the New Mohocks were caught?’

‘By the strangest coincidence eleven New. Mohocks and eleven members of the Twelves! Only one, the man whom you tried to stop, escaped.’

‘Is it known who he is?’

‘You will have to ask others that, later.’

Mary stood up and squeezed a sponge in a bowl of water on the table, wiped his head, face, hands and wrists, and emptied the bowl into an earthenware pitcher which she took out with her.

He thought he would stay awake, she was so vivid in his mind, but in fact he fell asleep quickly and slept soundly and without stirring for some hours. He woke only to doze off again, and when he opened his eyes next it was daylight. He did not want to harass Mary but doubted whether he could get out of bed safely by himself, so he pulled the rope and heard a faint ringing some distance off. In a surprisingly short time her footsteps sounded.

Mary helped him out of bed and to the commode, which was a tiny closet outside the door, and he was surprised to see one of the Harrington flush systems installed, while there was virtually no odour. It made a noisy clatter and the roar of watch was like a waterfall, so he was laughing when he went back into the bedroom. Mary had made the bed and had propped pillows up against a wooden rest covered with sail-cloth, and this greatly eased his shoulder. After tucking the blankets around him, she said she would get his breakfast. Ten minutes later she reappeared with a tray on which were scrambled eggs, fresh bread and butter, and a pitcher of hot milk and another of hot coffee.

‘Ring for me when you have finished,’ she said.

‘Can you not stay and talk?’ James pleaded.

‘There are children clamouring for their breakfast in the kitchen!’

‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I had forgotten you had others to care for.’

‘I only wish—’ she began, but broke off without finishing.

Using his right arm James was able to handle the food without difficulty; it was not until he began to eat that he realised how hungry he was, and how good the food was. He was sipping coffee when he heard voices downstairs, one of them Benedict Sly’s.

Approaching the door, Benedict called, ‘How is the people’s hero this morning?’ Pushing the door open, he strode in, his usually calm face filled with excitement. Suddenly his eyes blazed and he burst out, ‘The hero is being pampered, which is as it should be. Jamey - you, Bow Street and the capture of the Twelves are the talk of the town! Every newspaper carried the story in great detail and never have more newspaper reporters crowded into Bow Street. Jamey, you should see the store of ill-gotten wealth that was unearthed, close on fifty thousand pounds’ worth! Have no doubt the thieves will hang - and have no doubt you and all concerned will be much the richer when it is all over.’

‘Richer? How?’

From the inside of his jacket Benedict drew copies of The Daily Clarion and The Public Advertiser and spread them out in front of James, who saw the bold announcement in the middle of both pages, identical except that they were in different type, stating that all jewels stolen by the New Mohocks were recovered intact and that the owners reclaiming them upon producing identification were to reward James and his men—

James put the papers aside and said, ‘It was wrong to single me out for praise, Ben.’

‘I don’t agree with you,’ Benedict Sly said. ‘Had John Charleston been alive he would have been named with you. Full credit was done to him in yesterday’s newspapers. It is a triumph for Bow Street and for you. Revel in it while you can!’

In a room on the first rickety floor of an alehouse in Kensington a man lay in bed with a pretty, blue-eyed girl beside him, looking at his strikingly handsome face with adoration. He was reading the announcement which James Marshall had just read, and he was scowling. Suddenly he flung the paper aside.

‘I know what I would do with the likes of them,’ he growled. ‘I’d draw out their vitals and then hang them high and while they had life left in them I’d quarter them, too.’ He broke off as the girl’s eyes widened, only to go on: ‘Never mind what I say, Nell.’

His strong hand covered her breast and made a number of firm, bold strokes down to the pit of her stomach, until her whole body began to quiver.

Afterward, when he lay half asleep, she whispered, ‘Will you take me to see, Jake?’

‘Take you where?’ demanded Jacob Rackham. ‘To see the man drawn and quartered. I have seen dozens hanged at Tyburn and Tower Hill, but never a drawing and quartering.’

He drowned her words with a roar of laughter, but when that had stilled and they lay quiet, looking at the green fields beyond the window, he thought of what she had asked and of what he had said, and of the man James Marshall, who had come near to preventing his escape. Only once before had he felt such vicious anger towards a man, and that had been when he and the New Mohocks, early in their existence, had been amusing themselves with a girl and a stranger had come thrashing about, them with a staff, scattering them until two had fallen into an open sewer. They had carried the stench for weeks; he, the memory for much longer.

Jacob Rackham made the same promise to himself now that he had made then.

Later that same morning, the door of James’s room opened and, to his delight, his mother appeared, with Henrietta close behind. They were full of concern, eager in admiration, agog with their own tidings. Another building at the foundling home at St. Giles was almost ready. Even better news - a second such home was to be started near Staines, beyond Hounslow, by a friend of Sir Mortimer Tench’s who had observed what they were doing at St. Giles and planned to emulate them.

It was hard to believe there was still better news.

‘A report from Gordon’s says that Johnny has made great advances in studies and has caused no more problems, Ruth said happily. ‘And there is a suggestion that before he goes for further study, he should visit all the Furnival offices throughout the world.’ She stood up from the side of the bed and took his hands, and once again he was reminded of her resemblance to Mary. ‘Jamey, it is no exaggeration to say that I am inordinately proud of you but also a little apprehensive - both feelings I had so often for your father.’ She leaned over and kissed his forehead, her voice unsteady as she went on. ‘Both he and John Furnival would have been so proud of you, my son.’

Tears stung his eyes when she and Henrietta had gone.

Soon, however, he was shaken out of such a mood, for Timothy arrived, closely followed by David Winfrith with greetings and a note from the Fieldings.

Sitting down on the side of the bed, David said in a quivering voice, ‘Victims of the highwaymen are coming to inspect the recovered goods in droves, Jamey! And each - when he has satisfied one of the Mr. Fieldings and has answered his questions about that particular robbery, for the more evidence against the Twelves the better - goes off with his once lost property, leaving a handsome reward. Already the total is more than one hundred guineas. It would not surprise me if it grows to more than a thousand. If it is agreeable to you, ten per cent will be set aside as yours and the rest distributed—’

For the first time since he had been here James was taken by surprise by the opening of the door, and Mary came in, smiling and yet scolding.

‘Do you want him to die before he can use his share of the reward, David? You will have to stop talking, for he must rest.’

‘I confess I had not realised how fatigued I was,’ James admitted. ‘But, David, I do not require a greater share than others.’

‘Ten per cent also will go to the widow and family of John Charleston,’ David told him. ‘I had forgotten that.’

He went out, ignoring James’s protest at his leaving, and threw a teasing kiss at Mary as he went.

‘There are two things I would like,’ James told Mary that evening, never having felt more contented. ‘To have you stay for a while, not bustling about, and afterward to meet Mr. Weygalls.’

‘The first you can have if it pleases you,’ Mary replied, to his delighted surprise. ‘A kitchen maid will fetch the tray from the head of the stairs and will wash the dishes, the children are abed, and Mrs. Weygalls will sit downstairs with them. Mr. Weygalls has gone to a meeting of surgeons at Barbers’ Hall and will not be back until after you have gone to sleep.’ She took the tray out and when she came back she was without her apron, and looking as pretty as he had yet seen her. ‘Now that I am here what would you have me do?’ she asked, a gay note in her voice.

‘As the mood takes you I would like you to talk about yourself,’ James said.

He was asleep, about an hour later, when she left.

For five consecutive nights she sat with him and they talked or she read extracts from The Public Advertiser or The Daily Clarion, mostly about the stream of callers who came to seek their belongings. It proved that except for some gold plate stolen from a peer’s dining room and a few jewels, the Twelves had stored most of the valuables. They had, however, spent all of the money. On the seventh day, when James was out of bed and beginning to feel fractious, wanting to go out of doors, Benedict and David arrived together. The reward money, so they told him, now totalled more than fourteen hundred guineas, and there might yet be more! They went off leaving another phrase ringing in his ears.

‘Since Friday night there have to our knowledge been many fewer attacks by highwaymen. Neither the watchmen nor the Bow Street men have had a less strenuous time in winter.’

Surely this was proof of the effectiveness of the methods Bow Street had adopted; surely more official approval and bigger payment would soon be forthcoming and London would be given a peacekeeping force competent to subdue all major crime!

Paul Weygalls proved to be a short, plump, rather fussy-mannered man, quite different from the mind picture which James had conceived. He would not hear of payment or recompense for what he had done, telling James that the atmosphere of Covent Garden and around was unbelievably improved. People now dared venture abroad at night with much less fear. And indeed the effect on all London was most remarkable, most remarkable.

‘If there is a single thing I can do for you, Mr. Marshall, you have but to name it.’

‘There is one thing, sir,’ James said quietly.

‘Then as I say: name it.’

Heart beating fast, James replied, ‘I would like permission to visit Mary Smith from time to time, sir.’

‘I suspect that if I were to refuse I might no longer have a housekeeper!’ Weygalls smiled broadly and turned towards the door. ‘In the meantime, Mr. Marshall, I shall send her to see you straightaway.’

Two days later, after James had been, there for nine days, he went back to his rooms in the Strand. He was surprised to find three persons on the stairs, and in the office where he interviewed his callers, six more, four gentlemen and two ladies. Behind the desk were Benedict Sly and a youth whom James had never seen before. He proved to be Benedict’s younger brother Nicholas.

The Slys had maintained the business which, because of the publicity, had increased tenfold.

There was soon a much greater volume of work than ‘Mr. Londoner’ could handle, so he employed Nicholas Sly to maintain the office throughout the day, at the same time renting a small shop alongside it. He soon discovered that the lad’s love and knowledge of London rivalled his own, and it became Nicholas’ greatest pleasure to visit out-of-the-way parts of London and buy any small curiosities which took his fancy, cleaning and polishing them before putting them in the shop. There was always a ready market among visitors from abroad and from the provinces. As the weeks passed, Mary found herself free to visit James during the day, when the Weygalls’ children were at school. And when not engaged in work for Bow Street, James spent part of each evening visiting Mary, occasionally taking her to St. James’s Park to see the ducks on the lake or to stroll among the perambulating crowds along the Mall. After the excitement of the triumph over the Twelves, life took on an even tenor in most spheres.

As the pressure of court work declined in the spring, a noticeable change for the worse befell Henry Fielding. As well as dropsy, he suffered asthma and jaundice. At last, and under great pressure from his brother John, he agreed to go with his wife to a warmer climate, where the warmth and sun alone might help him. He left his work at the court for the last time in April, and many believed that his death was near. But he hung on to life and even wrote a little, revised some of his earlier novels, and lived through a May during the whole of which, it was said, the sun shone on London only three times. In June, a vessel was found to take him and his wife and family to Portugal, but because of bad weather there were considerable delays, and it was more than two months later, early in August 1754, before they arrived.

Within two months Henry Fielding was dead; and his brother and his friends mourned.

In London, during this time, John was appointed to the magistracy at Bow Street and prevailed on the government to continue paying for the execution of Henry’s plan. At the age of thirty-three, totally blind for fourteen years, he showed tremendous energy, courage and determination.

Saunders Welch was also made a magistrate, working sometimes at Bow Street with John Fielding, sometimes at his home in Long Acre.

The first years at St. Giles Foundling Home were a complete success. A rigid standard of cleanliness was kept, and of the first fifty near-starving children taken in, only three died. St. Giles became a show place and an example.

In June of 1755, Beth had her second child, a daughter.

‘And we shall call her Ruth Elizabeth Anne,’ Beth declared in a note. ‘She is absolutely precious, with blue eyes, and golden hair which Mamma says she will lose but I cannot believe. . .’

James was reading this, and smiling, when he heard footsteps on the stairs. Putting the letter aside, he was rising when David Winfrith burst in, pale and wild-eyed with anger.

‘The treacherous sons of Westminster bitches, pimps to their own mothers! How dare they show their ugly faces in the House! How dare they behave like woolly-haired bullies, the dirty, lousy crows! They are not worth John Fielding’s little finger! The Blind Beak can see farther than their stinking noses! There isn’t a highwayman in London who would not put them to shame!’