The Great Train Robbery (14 page)

There was no mention of the price of the girl, but Mr. Fowler hardly cared. His private parts were now swollen and extremely tender, so much so, in fact, that he could think of nothing else as he sat at his desk and tried to conduct the business of the day. He looked again at the letter and again felt reassured by the excellent impression it made. In every aspect, it smacked of the utmost reliability, and that was important. Fowler knew that many virgins were nothing of the sort, but rather young girls initiated a score of times over, with their “demure state” freshly renewed by the application of a small seamstress’s stitch in a strategic place.

He also knew that intercourse with a virgin was not
uniformly accepted as a cure for venereal disease. Many men swore the experience produced a cure; others rejected the idea. It was often argued that the failures resulted from the fact that the girl was not genuinely fresh. Thus Mr. Fowler looked at the stationery and the penmanship, and found there the reassurance he hoped to find. He sent off a quick note of vague thanks to his friend Pierce for his assistance in this matter.

On the same day that Mr. Fowler was writing a letter of thanks to Mr. Pierce, Mr. Pierce was preparing to crack the mansion of Mr. Trent. Involved in this plan were five people: Pierce, who had some inside knowledge of the layout of the house; Agar, who would make the wax impression of the key; Agar’s woman, who would act as “crow,” or lookout; and Barlow, who would be a “stall,” providing diversion.

There was also the mysterious Miss Miriam. She was essential to the planned housebreak, for she would carry out what was called “the carriage fakement.” This was one of the most clever methods of breaking into a house. For its effect, the carriage fakement relied upon a solid social custom of the day—the tipping of servants.

In Victorian England, roughly 10 percent of the entire population was “in service,” and nearly all were poorly paid. The poorest paid were those whose tasks brought them in contact with visitors and house guests: the butler
and the footman relied on tips for most of their annual income. Thus the notorious disdain of the footman for insubstantial callers—and thus too, the “carriage fakement.”

By nine o’clock on the evening of November 12, 1854, Pierce had his confederates in their places. The crow, Agar’s woman, lounged across the street from the Trent mansion. Barlow, the stall, had slipped down the alley toward the tradesmen’s entrance and the dog pens at the back of the house. Pierce and Agar were concealed in shrubbery right next to the front door. When all was in readiness, an elegant closed carriage drew up to the curb in front of the house, and the bell was rung.

The Trent household’s footman heard the ring, and opened the door. He saw the carriage drawn up at the curb. Dignified and conscious of tips, he was certainly not going to stand in the doorway and shout into the night to inquire what was wanted. When, after a moment, no one emerged from the carriage, he went down the steps to the curb to see if he could be of service.

Inside the carriage he saw a handsome, refined woman who asked if this was the residence of Mr. Robert Jenkins. The footman said it was not, but he knew of Mr. Jenkins; the house was around the corner, and he gave directions.

While this was happening, Pierce and Agar slipped into the house through the open front door. They proceeded directly to the cellar door. This door was locked, but Agar employed a twirl, or picklock, and had it open in a moment. The two men were inside the cellar, with the door closed behind them, by the time the footman received his shilling from the lady in the carriage. He tossed the coin in the air, caught it, walked back to the house, and locked up the door once more, never suspecting he had been tricked.

That was the carriage fakement.

*  *  *

In the light of a narrow-beam lantern, Pierce checked his watch. It was 9:04. That gave them an hour to find the key before Barlow provided his diversion to cover their escape.

Pierce and Agar moved stealthily down the creaking stairs into the depths of the cellar. They saw the wine racks, locked behind iron gratings. These new locks yielded easily to Agar’s attentions. At 9:11, they swung the grating door open and entered the wine cellar proper. They immediately began the search for the key.

There was no way to be clever about the search. It was a slow and painstaking business. Pierce could make only one assumption about the hiding place: since Mr. Trent’s wife was the person who usually went into the cellar, and since Mr. Trent did not want her coming across the key by accident, the banker probably hid his key at some inconveniently high location. They first searched the tops of the racks, feeling with their fingers. It was dusty, and there was soon a good deal of dust in the air.

Agar, with his bad lungs, had difficulty suppressing his cough. Several times his stifled grunts were sufficiently loud to alarm Pierce, but the Trent household never heard them.

Soon it was 9:30. Now, Pierce knew, time was beginning to work against them. Pierce searched more frantically and became impatient, hissing his complaints to Agar, who wielded the spot of light from the hot shaded lantern.

Ten more minutes passed, and Pierce began to sweat. And then, with startling suddenness, his fingers felt something cold on the top of the wine-rack crossbars. The object fell to the ground with a metallic clink. A few moments of scrambling around on the earthen floor of the cellar, and they had the key. It was 9:45.

Pierce held it into the spot from the lantern. In darkness, Agar groaned.

“What is it?” Pierce whispered.

“That’s not it.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean it’s not the ruddy key, it’s the wrong one.”

Pierce turned the key over in his hands. “Are you sure?” he whispered, but even as he spoke he knew Agar was right. The key was dusty and old; there was grime in the crevices of the prongs. Agar spoke his thoughts.

“Nobody’s touched her in ten years.”

Pierce swore, and continued his search, while Agar held the lantern. Agar looked at the key critically.

“Damn me but she’s odd,” he whispered. “I never seen the likes of it. Small as she is, delicate-like, could be a lady’s twirl to some female trifle, you ask me—”

“—Shut up,” Pierce hissed.

Agar fell silent. Pierce searched, feeling his heart thump in his chest, not looking at his watch, not wanting to know the time. Then his fingers again felt cold metal. He brought it into the light.

It was a shiny key.

“That’s for a safe,” Agar said when he saw it.

“Right,” Pierce said, sighing. He took the lantern and held it for Agar. Agar fished two wax blanks from his pockets. He held them in his hands to warm them a moment, and then he pressed the key into them, first one side, then the other.

“Time?” he whispered.

“Nine-fifty-one,” Pierce said.

“I’ll do another,” Agar said, and repeated the process with a second set of blanks. This was common practice among the most adept screwsmen, for one never knew when a blank might be later injured after a break-in. When he had two sets, Pierce returned the key to its hiding place.

“Nine-fifty-seven.”

“Crikey, it’s close.”

They left the wine cellar, locking it behind them, and slipped up the stairs to the basement door. Then they waited.

Barlow, lurking in the shadows near the servants’ quarters, checked his own pocketwatch and saw it was ten o’clock. He had a moment of hesitation. On the one hand, every minute his accomplices spent inside the Trent household was dangerous; on the other hand, they might not have finished their work, despite the planned schedule. He had no wish to be the villain, greeted by the spectacle of their angry faces when they made their escape.

Finally he muttered to himself, “Ten is ten,” and carrying a bag, he moved back to the dog kennels. Three dogs were there, including the new gift of a made dog from Mr. Pierce. Barlow bent over the run and pushed four squeaking rats out of the bag and into the enclosure. Immediately, the dogs began to yelp and bark, raising a terrible din.

Barlow slipped off into the shadows as he saw the lights come on in one window after another in the servants’ quarters.

Pierce and Agar, hearing the commotion, opened the cellar door and moved into the hallway, locking that door behind them. There was the sound of running footsteps at the back of the house. They unfastened the locks and bolts of the front door, let themselves out, and disappeared into the night.

They left behind them only one sign of their visit: the unlocked front door. They knew that in the morning the footman, being first to arrive, would come upon the front door and find the locks open. But he would remember the incident of the carriage the night before,
and would assume that he had forgotten to lock up afterward. He might secretly suspect a housebreak, but as the day went on and nothing was discovered missing, he would forget all about it.

In any case, no burglary of the Trent residence was ever reported to authorities. The mysterious commotion of the dogs was explained by the bodies of the dead rats in the kennels. There was some discussion of how the rats had found their way into the dog run, but the Trent household was large and busy, and there was no time for idle speculation on trivial matters.

Thus, by dawn of November 13, 1854, Edward Pierce had the first of the four keys he needed. He immediately directed his attention to obtaining the second key.

Mr. Henry Fowler could scarcely believe his eyes. There, in the faint glow of the street gas lamp, was a delicate creature, rosy-cheeked and wonderfully young. She could not be much past the age of consent of twelve, and her very posture, bearing, and timid manner bespoke her tender and uninitiated state.

He approached her; she replied softly, halting, with downcast eyes, and led him to a brothel lodging house not far distant. Mr. Fowler eyed the establishment with some trepidation, for the exterior was not particularly prepossessing. Thus it was a pleasant surprise when the child’s gentle knock at the door received an answer from an exceedingly beautiful woman, whom the child
called “Miss Miriam.” Standing in the hallway, Fowler saw that this accommodation house was not one of those crude establishments where beds were rented for five shillings an hour and the proprietor came round and rapped on the door with a stick when the time was due; on the contrary, here the furnishings were plush velvet, with rich drapings, fine Persian carpets, and appointments of taste and quality. Miss Miriam comported herself with extraordinary dignity as she requested one hundred guineas, her manner was so wellborn that Fowler paid without a quibble, and he proceeded directly to an upstairs room with the little girl, whose name was Sarah.

Sarah explained that she had lately come from Derbyshire, that her parents were dead, that she had an older brother off in the Crimea, and a younger brother in the poorhouse. She talked of all these events almost gaily as they ascended the stairs. Fowler thought he detected a certain overexcited quality to her speech; no doubt the poor child was nervous at her first experience, and he reminded himself to be gentle.

The room they entered was as superbly furnished as the downstairs sitting room; it was red and elegant, and the air was softly perfumed with the scent of jasmine. He looked about briefly, for a man could never be too careful. Then he bolted the door and turned to face the girl.