The Masters of Bow Street Read online

  ‘I told you before, you should change your informers,’ he said. ‘Efficient ones would tell you that I have fathered more sons than the rest of the family put together, even if each is a bastard! I know, Will; or I know about most of them, for I see that neither they nor their mothers starve. Nor do I interfere if the mothers marry and give the brats good homes. As for marriage, I want no more vapid women swooning over me and screaming at the sound of a pistol being cocked, and I want no puling infants.’ He placed his hands on the arms of his chair again and stood up very slowly, appearing, because of his size, to tower over his brother. ‘I’ll tell you other things I don’t want. I don’t want to sit around a big table with my brothers and the rest of the family discussing how to take more money out of London.

  ‘You can afford to protect yourselves properly while the protection of the ordinary and decent people is left to the corrupt and the decrepit. As you and your kind have made London grow until the system of parish councils and watchmen has broken down, you have also created a race that appears more animal than human, people who live like rats in holes, and who, when they gather in any one place, become the mob. If we don’t find a way to create better conditions for them, one day they will turn upon us and devour us. All the government does, all the King does, is create new capital offences, and those like you think this will be sufficient deterrent. Our present King has approved more than thirty new capital crimes. Such monstrous crimes as stealing a shilling from a man’s pocket or five shillings from his shop, for taking clothes from a bleaching ground, for entering grounds with intent to kill game or rabbits, even for being on the highway with a blackened face and a shotgun to drive off footpads.

  ‘That is the London you are creating, William - you and your colleagues protected by your hired thugs. I had no desire to tell you what I think about you and your kind and some of the things you do, but you leave me no choice. Many of the results of your activities are as evil as those of any in London, and worse than most because you use a cloak of piety and respectability to cover your deeds.’ John Furnival drew a deep breath. ‘Do you understand me, Will?’ he roared. ‘Go back and tell the others no, no, a thousand times no! I’d rather swing at Tyburn than go your way to hell!’

  Lisa Braidley heard his raised voice. So did Moffat. Two thief-takers, men who had come to see the justice, were stepping out of the courtroom precincts, impatient at long waiting. One of them cocked a thumb towards the door and Moffat saw them go into Bow Street only a few seconds ahead of William Furnival, who came quickly down the stairs, his face pale with anger. A third man waiting to see John Furnival saw but did not appear to be noticed by William, who stalked out before Moffat could reach the door into Bow Street and open it for him.

  ‘I’ll come back in the morning,’ the third man said to Moffat in a low-pitched voice.

  ‘How urgent is the matter you came about?’ asked Moffat.

  ‘I’ve had a report that Dick Miller is close to Tyburn Turnpike,’ the other man said. ‘If he is then we could set up a catch for him. It’s not a certainty, howsoever—’

  ‘You wait here for another ten minutes,’ decided Moffat. ‘If the magistrate is not down by then I’ll send a message to you later.’

  ‘Later could be too late,’ the other man grumbled.

  Neither of them had heard John Furnival come through the upstairs door which his brother had left open or saw him at the head of the stairs, but they heard his mild-sounding voice which confirmed what Moffat already knew: that the justice had never lost his composure, that the bull-like roar had been as considered as was everything he did, uttered only to infuriate his brother and send him off in a rage. Moffat was quite right: John Furnival wanted William to convince the other members of the family that it would be a waste of time to try to woo the eldest brother from his chosen occupation.

  ‘What did you say about Dick Miller, Harris?’ he asked.

  The man with Moffat turned his head slowly, thick neck bulging over his tight shirt. He had more the look of the yokel or farm labourer, for his clothes had a homespun appearance and he wore leather gaiters over tough leather boots marked at heel and instep by stirrups. He was indeed of farming stock, for his family owned fifty acres near Highgate; he was also one of the very few of Furnival’s men whom the justice trusted implicitly. He had been a close friend of Richard Marshall’s, and a principal witness that Jackson had murdered Marshall.

  ‘’Tis said he’s close by Tyburn Turnpike,’ he replied, ‘lurking there to pounce on any wealthy merchant who was at the fair. He’s one of a dozen highwaymen waiting there, but the only one I know of any consequence.’

  ‘What would you have me do?’ asked Furnival as he came down the stairs. ‘Speak up, man, I haven’t all the time in the world!’

  ‘I would send out a decoy,’ replied Tom Harris, ‘a young dandy and a lady for my preference. Miller can never resist a pretty face. And I would have enough men close by to take Dick the moment he attacks.’

  ‘Or else take a bullet or a hail of shot from a blunderbus,’ Furnival retorted. ‘And the decoy take a chance that Dick will carry off his lady or rape her in front of his eyes. Do we have heroes and heroines willing to take the chance?’

  ‘I think so, sir.’

  ‘Who?’ demanded Furnival suspiciously.

  ‘Red Foster and his wife,’ Harris answered. ‘Things have been bad for them since Red came out of Newgate and he doesn’t want to go back. For ten pounds he and his wife would act as decoys, and a share of the blood money if we catch Miller.’

  ‘If I remember her, she’s a pretty enough wench,’ mused Furnival reminiscently. ‘Silas, give Harris ten pounds from my personal box for the Fosters, and spare the lady a prayer. And you be careful, Tom. I don’t want to lose you.’

  ‘You won’t lose me if I can prevent it,’ Harris replied dryly.

  Furnival chuckled. ‘I’ll wager that’s the truth!’ He nodded and turned towards the room at the end of the passage, where Lisa was waiting. Halfway there he turned back and called in his clear, quiet, but carrying voice, ‘Have you seen Marshall’s widow of late?’

  ‘Yes, sir. I see her two or three times a week.’

  ‘How is she and how are things with her?’

  ‘She took her husband’s murder hard, sir, but she lacks nothing in courage. She works as a seamstress when she can get work, and her son earns by carrying messages and delivering goods for a merchant in Long Acre.’

  Furnival looked at the other for what seemed a long time, then nodded and turned away. The front door opened on to near-darkness, the flickering yellow-red of the torch flares of a coach-and-four, the clatter of hooves on the cobbles. The door beyond the stairs opened to Lisa Braidley, now dressed in a robe, bending over the fire with a log held in a pair of iron tongs. Nearby, a table was set for two, with a three-holder silver candlestick casting a pale-glow. Beyond the table a back hallway had been converted by Furnival into a sleeping alcove with a double-bed, a dressing table and a wide mirror on another wall.

  ‘Come, my dear,’ John Furnival said, and took her shoulders and delved to her breast beneath the robe. Soon, when his clothes were draped over a carved oak chair and they were lying together, he said huskily, ‘We’ll be quiet for a while.’ And soon, he said, ‘Would there were milk in your fine breasts, Lisa. I’d suckle and draw strength from you.’

  He caressed, playing, teasing, was gradually soothed, and soon was stirred explosively in his loins.

  3: RUTH MARSHALL

  James Marshall walked from Tyburn to Newgate Prison, in the face of the thousands making their way towards the turnpikes and the small country villages beyond. Walking time was much less than an hour, although the execution procession took twice that long. He had often made the walk, sometimes with his father, and had occasionally ridden behind his father on Dare, a horse he had known since he could remember; twice he had ridden proudly alongside his father on a borrowed hack or pony. As he drew nearer Newgate all was quiet,
but farther along Holborn and approaching Newgate Prison itself the crowds grew thicker. Many entered the gin palaces; others stood and watched the bearbaiting, hearing the snarling fury of the goaded animals and the sharp ring of the goading sticks against the iron cage; small, tight groups of men watched two gamecocks, laying their bets as the birds tore at each other’s eyes and bodies with steel-tipped claws. Lights flickered over the entrances to alehouses; prostitutes stood bare-breasted at the open doors of the brothels, some actually on the main highway; men and women coupled in nearby passages, and small children with silken-touch hands stole wallets for their wayward mothers, or the women themselves, pretending warm embrace, lifted wallet or watch, purse or snuffbox, while their victims strained and grunted, gurgled and gasped.

  The boy was oblivious of these things, for on the nights of the Tyburn hangings they were as normal as breathing. He passed Tyburn Tree, long since replaced as the gallows; indeed, the weight of a man on many of the branches would bring the branch down, the tree was so old. He passed along Oxford Road, with its small shops and taverns, down Holborn Hill and at last reached Newgate, not long ago part of the wall of London.

  He had always been fascinated by the story of the prison, rebuilt on the greater part of Sir Richard Whittington’s fortune, which he left for good works after he died in 1423.

  James liked to imagine that Dick Whittington had desired a prison which was clean, and where there would be justice above all. But Dick Whittington’s prison had soon become a place of infamy and terror. It stood until burned down by the Great Fire of London in 1666.

  So this was the fourth prison of the name.

  There it stood, tall and black-grey, with its arched gateway and narrow windows, the three statues just above the great arch. Atop the castellated roof a windmill turned sluggishly in a light wind, drawing some of the foul air out of the prison and dispersing it into the skies, driving a slender draught of cleaner air down into the cells and even to the dungeons. There debtor and murderer, highwayman and coiner, man and woman, boy and girl, lived in the stinking filth, fed, if they were lucky, by friends or relatives, or by turnkeys who took their money and charged extortionate prices for food which was almost impossible to eat.

  When James had been here before, he had known that his father had come to question the prisoners in the murderers’ and not in the debtors’ side. He knew also that his father had taken food that he had seen his mother prepare to men he had arrested or helped to arrest and who would one day be hanged; meat pies and fruit turnovers, with slices of savoury-stuffed veal or rich fat pork, cheese wrapped in its muslin cloth and a small wooden dish of butter.

  He had never been able to understand what moved his parents to pity, but some such emotion had stirred in him when he had seen the cart jolt away and Frederick Jackson swinging. Was it pity?

  Was it what his mother and father had felt?

  He heard the clatter of iron hooves on the cobbles, moved hurriedly to one side and saw a well-known thief-taker and an assistant hustle a captive inside. He watched the jailers as the carriage door opened and three men climbed out and hurried towards the lodge, where the jailers seized the prisoner and took him into a small stone building attached to it. Clearly they had been warned of his coming, for manacles were clapped onto his wrists before a word was spoken and he was hustled away.

  A smaller carriage arrived and the coachman called out: ‘I’ve one for the Master Debtors’ quarters. Who’ll come for him?’

  A man dressed in the height of fashion climbed down, looked disdainfully about him and walked, unescorted, to the lodge. Only a single jailer came to him, a big-bellied man who touched his forehead and said, ‘Mr. Eustace, sir?’

  ‘Yes. That is my name.’

  ‘All ready for you, sir,’ the jailer said in a hoarse voice. ‘Everything’s as comfortable as it can be. If you want anything just let me know.’ It was difficult to judge whether his ugly brown teeth were bared in a smile or a snarl.

  James Marshall turned away, disgusted. A ‘master debtor’, thanks to his friends, could afford to pay for the best, as if this were a hotel. And while he had money, even the senior jailer would toady to him.

  James knew the prison was comprised of the Master Debtors’ Side, the Master Felons’ Side, the Common Side for Debtors and the Common Side for Felons, as well as the Press Yard, the Castle and the Gate. Both the Common Side for Debtors and the Common Side for Felons were supposed to be for women only, but he knew from his father that the whole prison was a jungle. The terms ‘Master Side’ and ‘Common Side’ referred to the lodgments of those who paid and those who did not pay the keeper of the jail for their accommodation.

  James’s legs began to feel achy and tired but it did not occur to him to stop. He was two miles from the rooms he shared with his mother and two sisters, chosen because of their proximity to Bow Street and his father’s work. The only change was that his thinking was blurred now, and he did not look at the sights he passed, did not feel the raw chill of the autumn night, did not hear the laughter of drunken men or the wailing of women or the sounds of evening traffic.

  It was nearly ten o’clock when he turned off Long Acre into a side street, then into a yard, or small square, close to Bow Yard, and slipped into a narrow alley lit by two flares sheltered inside glass frames. Here was Cobbold Yard, where tradespeople lived, prosperous enough to keep servants, to pay for ‘protection’ in the form of two men even now dozing in the doors, staffs aslant, placed so as to give them a sharp crack across head or shoulder if they slipped because the men slept.

  One woke enough to ask in a sharp but frightened voice: ‘Who is it now? Who passes?’

  ‘It’s all right, William,’ the boy said. ‘’Tis only I, James Marshall.’

  ‘I don’t know what the young are coming to, coming home in the middle of the night. And your poor mother, scared half to death she is because you didn’t get home on time.’

  ‘Good night.’ James Marshall strode briskly to the door leading to the back stairs which led to their two rooms. He started up them quickly but confidently enough, but slowed down as he drew near the door which his mother might open at any moment. He did not know why he was afraid, for his mother would at most remonstrate with him. Had his father been alive he could have expected a beating for being out so late; he had often been frightened of returning late without a good excuse.

  Yet he felt differently now - worse.

  He did not know, although later the years told him, that on this day when Jackson’s execution could not fail to awaken painful memories of the shooting, already six months past because Jackson had used every device to postpone his trial and to buy false witnesses, he should have been with his mother. He simply knew that there was disquiet within him; new sensations which were not simply fear.

  Ruth Marshall heard her son’s voice in the yard, and the querulous tone of the guard, but she did not get out of her chair. A glow of red embers which filled the fireplace and cookstove provided the only warmth in these two rooms. The younger children were already in the smaller room, asleep, one at each end of a bed built from the wall; her bed was beneath it, much wider: her bed and Richard’s. With Richard and the quilts there had been no cold nights, but now she was often cold. An iron pot was warm on the black iron stove, filled with meat soup which James liked; bread stood on the table with some cold vegetables and a piece of dried-looking cheese.

  It was such a supper as she had often shared with both Richard and James on nights when they had been home in time to eat and talk before going to bed. In a strange way she missed their discussions more than any other single thing except her loving with Richard.

  How father and son had talked!

  How proud Richard had been of the boy! Even though he had never said so in James’s presence, for fear of making him swelled-headed. For from a very early age - earlier than that of Beth today, with her childish prattle and her giggles and her easy tears - James had used words as if taught their si
gnificance in the womb. A prodigy, Richard had called him.

  ‘We’ve brought forth a scholar, Ruth,’ he would say. ‘A boy with a man’s mind already.’

  Richard had had access to many books through his friend the Reverend Sebastian Smith. He borrowed and read them, then allowed his son to read them before discussing with the boy the author’s meaning, the significance of the phrases and the philosophies. The more complex facts he would explain with extreme care, and his son always remembered. As the boy grew older, his interest in the rest of the world, in trade, in the figures quoted in the Annual Register, developed. There were two coffee houses in which he was permitted to sit for hours over a single mug of coffee, reading newspapers, absorbing the events of London especially, reading about crime and criminals, about his father’s work and about that of John Furnival and Bow Street. Afterward he would talk over what he had read with his father, forever seeking explanations and information.

  Sitting and listening, Ruth had absorbed a great deal of knowledge, just as, at James’s age, she had from her own father. But she could not expound, as Richard had; and today as always she found it difficult to talk with her son except on homely matters.

  She knew that he still read a great deal.

  She could only guess how much he missed the talks with his father.

  She heard her son hesitate outside the door, but still she did not move.

  Slowly the door opened and he came in.

  There was nothing furtive about the way James entered; there had never been anything furtive about him. She did not understand his expression but was aware of something different about him; perhaps it was due to the candlelight, but whatever the cause, he seemed older, older and very tired. He closed the door as cold night air swept up the narrow staircase and stood looking at her for a while, as if he were seeing something different in her, too. Quite without warning he crossed to her and went down on his knees, leaning against them and looking up into her face. She opened her mouth but no words came. Her right hand moved and touched and then soothed his forehead. He could feel the roughness at the end of her forefinger where she pushed the head of the needle; too often she sewed without a thimble.