The Kingdom of Bones (9 page)

THIRTEEN

T
he wagon measured about eight feet by six. There were two plain benches, one down either side; after the first lurch into motion he sat with his feet braced wide against the bench opposite, as the handcuffs made it difficult for him to steady himself any other way.

He could barely see. The only light came from vents in the roof and a single barred window in the door, through which he could hear boys following in the street and shouting something he couldn’t make out. As the wagon bounced along, Sayers desperately tried to make some sense of the past half hour. He could not.

There was no doubting that his situation was dire. He’d begun by thinking that there had been some terrible misunderstanding that would be cleared up by a closer investigation, but that clearly would not do. No misunderstanding could explain the death of Arthur Steffens or the presence of his remains in Sayers’ room; no simple human error could have placed him there. This was an act of deliberate and double malice, both in the murder and in the directing of blame for it.

Sayers had last seen Arthur in life at the playhouse. He was not lodging at Mrs. Mack’s, but with the stage crew over the pub in Cross Lane. He must have been killed and his body carried up to the attic room sometime between the end of the night’s performance and Sayers’ return from his small-hours walk. Which suggested to Sayers that only someone inside the lodging house would have been positioned and able to take the opportunity.

All of his instincts pointed him to James Caspar. Unfortunately, no evidence did. Caspar’s dissolute habits and their shared antipathy were proof of nothing; Sayers could speak of them and hope that the police might be moved to uncover some damning new information, but such effort on their part was unlikely. They were in no doubt that they had their man.

He heard the driver calling to the horses, and felt the wagon slow. The bone shaking grew more intense as it went into a turn, and Sayers had to brace himself harder or be thrown onto his side. To be shackled in handcuffs was a greater torment than he could ever have imagined. The physical discomfort was bearable, but because of their restriction he fought a constant urge to panic.

The wagon came to a halt. Nothing happened for a while, and nobody came to speak to him. He went to the door and, looking out through the bars, saw that he was in a police yard with a high brick wall around it. An ostler was leading horses across open ground while, over at the yard’s far side, the gates by which they’d entered were being closed by an elderly watchman. The watchman had lost a limb, but moved with speed and skill on his remaining leg and a wooden crutch.

Sayers settled again, and after a while they came for him. He heard the padlock being removed, and then one of the uniformed men looked in through the bars, in case the prisoner should decide to come out fighting.

Six of them were waiting for him in the yard. Big, experienced-looking men, and their sergeant the biggest of them all. They had truncheons at the ready, and for a moment Sayers thought that he was to be driven with a beating toward the police station’s jail entrance. But they formed a group around him and he was pushed, prodded, and generally herded toward the grim redbrick building overlooking the yard.

During the next hour, he was given a prisoner’s examination and photographed. The handcuffs were removed and he was finally able to button his shirt and put on his waistcoat. He moved wherever he was sent, stood where he was told to stand. He resisted any urge to argue or rebel, knowing that neither would go well for him. He needed to maintain his composure until given the opportunity to speak. Any protest before then would be wasted indignation.

At no point was he left alone or unsupervised. Finally, he was walked into a room where Sebastian Becker and two much older, more senior-looking men were waiting. Both were high-collared and bearded and had small, hard-button eyes. The big sergeant from the yard stood just inside the door, and a shorthand clerk sat ready to take down anything that Sayers might say. The room had bare walls of painted brick and a cellar-style window that was too high to reach, and too small to escape through if anyone ever did.

There was a chair, and he was allowed to sit. Sayers was told of the charges against him, and at last had the opportunity to provide an account of himself.

After giving his birth date and such other details of his life that he could be sure of, he started to speak in the knowledge that whatever he said now would be an important record for the days ahead. Forthright or evasive, self-possessed or sniveling, here would be set down his character as the world would know it.

“I was a prizefighter and professional sportsman for seven years,” he said. “I was in training at Chesham for a bout with Charles Wainwright, and I was attacked and struck on the arm with an iron bar. It was an attempt to influence the result, I’m certain of that. But they did their work too well and I was unable to fight at all. I’d borrowed one thousand pounds from the Marquis of Reddesley in advance of the match, and it had to be repaid.

“I wrote a boxing sketch and got up a small company to play it around the halls. As a fighter I had a certain popularity, and I repaid the debt. But people’s memories fade very quickly, and so I turned my hand to management. I’ve managed for several companies since. Whitlock’s for the past two years.”

The two senior men continued to sit without expression throughout, while Sebastian Becker listened closely. He seemed to be searching for some particular meaning or enlightenment that he did not, could not, find.

He said, “I don’t understand you, Sayers.” The story he seemed to understand well enough; it was the man he could not fathom.

“There is much here that I do not understand, Inspector Becker.”

“Is it some form of a blood lust? Something you could no longer satisfy in the ring and so you had to turn it onto the rest of us instead? I’ve seen murder for gain. For revenge. Out of rage or for passion. But never before have I seen such cruel and unusual murder for sheer love of its horror.”

“I’ve harmed no one.”

“You blinded a man in the ring once.”

“I fought by the rules. The man knew the risks.”

“What am I looking at, Sayers? Are you an aberration? Or are you something terrible and new?”

“You are looking at an innocent man, Inspector Becker.”

“Don’t you realize that only cooperation can help you now? You’ll still hang, of course. Nothing can change that. But there’s more than one path to the gallows.”

“You speak of hanging. You found a boy in my room that I neither harmed nor placed there, and you speak of crimes against people that I do not know nor have even met. At no time did I ever hear the name of Clive Turner-Smith until I had it from your lips.”

“You arranged to meet him in the saloon of the public house by the theater during the second act of last night’s performance. Your note was still in his pocket when you speared him with his own blade.”

“I put my hand to no note. And at no time did I ever leave the theater.”

“The saloon bar was a matter of yards from the stage door. No one saw you backstage in that time.”

“I went to look at the play from the back of the auditorium.”

“Where everyone’s attention was on the players. How very convenient.”

“Ask Lily Haynes. She works behind the bar. She saw me. She spoke to me.”

“Not in the second half of the evening, she didn’t. Admit it, Sayers. Stop lying. Behave like a man and not the base thing you have descended to. You’ve left a trail of blood that matches your company’s dates exactly. Did you think that by targeting paupers and unfortunates in different places you might escape notice for your crimes? A fifteen-year-old boy saw through you. And the evidence he provided will damn you.”

Saying this, he picked up the page of pasted newsprint that he’d taken from the body in the lodging house, and thrust it out for Sayers to see. Suddenly, instinct and reason moved a step closer together.

“Caspar,” Sayers breathed.

“Mister Caspar was onstage throughout the evening. He has seven hundred and fifty ticket-holding witnesses. How many could have spoken for you? One. Whom you strangled and stuffed into a box with your second-best suit.”

“In God’s name, Becker, don’t close your mind to me or a terrible injustice will be done!”

“Don’t quote the name of God at me, Sayers. If God exists, you serve a different master. I take it you will not confess.” He rose to his feet. The clerk stopped writing, and began to pack away his notebook and writing kit. One of the two senior men muttered something inaudible to the inspector, and then he and his colleague left the room.

Sebastian Becker came around to stand in front of Sayers. He crouched a little and looked into the prizefighter’s eyes, as if in search of something.

“Help me, Sayers,” he said. “It cannot change your fate, but help me to understand. Lily Haynes would believe no ill of you. Clearly, she is wrong. But how can a man who inspires such loyalty in his friends be capable of such deeds as yours? How can a fiend be in any way human, Sayers? Or a human being truly a fiend?”

“You’d have me explain what I do not know,” Sayers said. “I tell you once more, I am innocent of these deeds. Call back your clerk, and I’ll tell you again.”

Sebastian Becker straightened up and said, “You have killed an officer of the law. That means he was a brother to every man here. But we are not beasts as you are, Sayers. You
will
face the ultimate penalty, but there will be no rough handling. The true test of justice comes in moments like these.”

Sayers had the impression that these words, though directed at him, may have been more for the benefit of the uniformed man by the door.

“Sergeant,” the inspector said, “take him down.”

FOURTEEN

T
he sergeant’s grip was tight on Tom Sayers’ arm as he was walked down the corridor, away from the interview rooms and in the direction of the lockup cells. As well as being an effective form of restraint, it allowed the sergeant to sense the intentions of the man in his charge. Any impulse to bolt or rebel would signal itself, even as the thought was beginning to form. Sayers could see that any such attempt would be futile. However he considered it, his position seemed bleak.

He needed friends outside this place, and he needed them urgently. He thought of Edmund Whitlock, his employer, and almost in the same moment dismissed all hope of help from that quarter. The thought of him so teary-eyed and regretful in the lodging-house hallway was still fresh in Sayers’ mind. For all his playing of kings and heroes, the actor was not a steadfast man. He clearly took Sayers’ guilt at face value, as would many. Whitlock was unlikely to be an effective ally—especially if it meant that he’d have to turn against James Caspar.

Sayers still could not fathom the hold exercised by the younger man over the older, but he had seen its effects over the months. In Caspar’s presence the normally intolerant actor became indulgent, and forgiving of his protégé’s faults to the point of embarrassment. The younger man’s influence was like the sergeant’s grip; where it bound, it also gave control.

As they drew level with a door in the jail corridor, the sergeant forced him to a halt. It was a heavy door, reinforced and painted gray, but it was not like those to the cells. The sergeant rapped on it twice, and within seconds was answered by the sound of a turning key and the door swinging open into daylight. Sayers was shoved through without ceremony. He tripped on the threshold and only regained his balance once outside.

He found himself in a cage within the police compound. It resembled a large zoo enclosure and appeared to be a corner exercise yard for prisoners. Although open to the sky, it had a roof of bars that cast their shadow across the ground. Over on the far side of it three men waited, spread out in a line. They’d removed their helmets and tunics and rolled up their shirtsleeves.

When Sayers looked to the sergeant for an explanation, it was to see him unbuckling the wide belt that he wore over his own tunic. The constable who’d unlocked the door was now securing it after them.

“I see,” said Sayers.

“No rough handling,” said the sergeant pleasantly. “But you being a sporting man, we thought you might appreciate a little friendly competition.”

His tunic came off to reveal a shirt and braces that clothed the wide chest and thick belly of a natural brute. Ugly as an afterbirth, here was a man who need live neither cleanly nor well to give off an air of physical threat.

“You wish to fight me?” said Sayers.

“You were the famous Tom Sayers, once,” the sergeant said. “Call it a private demonstration of the fistic arts.”

With the door now secured, the constable took the sergeant’s tunic and helmet and carried them across the cage. He passed the other three, less hefty than their sergeant but born brawlers all. Outside the enclosure, police wagons had been drawn forward to screen the area from general view. Dropping the tunic and helmet onto a general pile, the constable now let himself out through a gate and took up a lookout position in the yard.

Sayers’ heart had quickened, and without even thinking he shifted his weight to a more ready stance. He said, “And by what rules would such a friendly competition be conducted?”

“Newton Street rules,” said the sergeant, turning away. Sayers began to reply, but mistook the man’s intentions. The sergeant came back with his elbow raised and smashed the point of it into Sayers’ upper arm, as hard as he could.

Sayers staggered back, clutching at his arm just below the shoulder. The pain was sudden and enormous. It was the same limb and almost the same spot at which he’d been struck and disabled by the mob that had ended his career. Back then, they’d cornered him in an alley and overwhelmed him. He managed not to cry out, but tears came to his eyes and for a few moments he was blinded.

Had they gone at him right there and then, all would have been lost. But the men stood back and watched, one or two of them grinning. Sayers let go of his arm and flexed his hand, trying to set his face so that he would not wince further and show them weakness.

He said, “I think I have grasped the basic principles.”

He could see their intentions now. Each man wanted to be able to brag that he had taken on the celebrated prizefighter and beaten him, yet none had any interest in an equal contest. However they might dress it up as sport, in the final reckoning this was to be rough justice over the death of one of their own. Should the magistrate query his condition in the morning, it would be explained that he had become violent, or had attempted an escape. Five witnesses would all agree. More might be found if required.

He said, “Will you allow yourselves the dignity of coming on one at a time, instead of all in a gang?”

“Certainly,” said the sergeant, and moved around to the middle of the yard to be first.

Sayers raised his fists, and worked his shoulders a little to relax them. The pain in his upper arm still raged, and he knew that he would have to protect it. He felt no fear, even though there was little chance that this would go well for him. Fight back with any success, and they’d be on him like dogs. But like the onetime professional he was, he concentrated entirely on the task in hand.

The sergeant squared up, mocking Sayers’ stance in a womanly way. Sayers felt dwarfed and slight in comparison to the quarter-ton of beef in shirtsleeves before him. The sergeant was clearly a man who had both dealt out and taken a good deal of punishment in his time, and had no need of grace or finesse.

Suddenly, the man came on. No circling, no testing out of his opponent’s defenses, just a straight walk toward Sayers for the purpose of landing a blow. Sayers aimed a jab, but it was weak because he was trying to hit his man and back off at the same time. The sergeant didn’t stop, but came crowding on in. He got one arm around Sayers and a fist in against the side of his head, a knuckle-skidder that hurt but did no resounding damage.

Sayers got out from under and circled around behind his man, as the sergeant turned around to keep facing him.

“What’s the matter, Molly-boy?” the big man said. “Old men and children more to your taste?”

This was like fighting an ape or a bear. Had this been the ring, the sergeant would have been booed out of it or disqualified within a round or two. But he wasn’t here to play by the rules. He was out to slap down and maul the little dancing man for the amusement of all.

Sayers stayed out of reach, and tried a couple of feints that the sergeant didn’t fall for. When one of the policeman’s big fists took a swipe for his head, he ducked it and got in a couple of body blows that the sergeant seemed hardly to feel.

As they continued to circle, the sergeant turned his own trick back on him, moving as if to strike without actually striking. Sayers overreacted, provoking derision from those watching. As one made noise, another cautioned silence. The man outside the bars looked back at them, anxiously.

Sayers saw an opening, and aimed a hook. But the policeman did no less than catch Sayers’ fist in his own enormous hand and hold it there in midair, squeezing it hard and laughing as Sayers tried to pull it free. The sergeant had caught it in such a way that the bones of his hand were being mashed together, causing him cruel pain.

Newton Street rules,
thought Sayers. And much as it went against every one of his instincts, he raised his leg and aimed the heel of his boot at the inner side of the big man’s kneecap.

As his heel made contact, he felt the edge of it hook under the bone. In the same moment, he felt the gristle rip as the entire kneecap dislodged.

Instantly, the grip on his hand was released. The sergeant’s jaw had fallen open in a big O and his eyes bulged wide. He made no sound.

Sayers took the opportunity to choose his move with science and care. He put in a right uppercut that slammed the sergeant’s jaw shut with an audible snap, and then a left hook that made the big man’s face ripple from one end to the other like a reflection in water.

The sergeant seemed to hesitate in the air. Then he went down.

The others were rushing at Sayers before his man had hit the ground. When he did, the air came out of him like a canvas bag.

Sayers struck at the first oncomer. He hurt him, but did not stop him. The other two were grabbing for his arms, but he knew better than to allow himself to be held. He winded one and butted the other.

The winded man was out of it, but the others came back on. Sayers grabbed the nearest and ran him back into the bars of the cage, hard; he could feel the other trying to get a grip on his shirt to haul him away, so he spun with his man and brought the two of them together. They collided shoulder to shoulder like carcasses swung on chains.

One dropped to his knees, spitting blood from a bitten tongue. The other fell to Tom Sayers’ right cross. All four men were down, but only one of them was fully unconscious. Now the lookout was on his way to join in.

As he came through the gate, Sayers met him with the only sure takedown blow that he could see an opening for: a straight-on, bare-knuckle poleax strike between the eyes, almost as much agony to land as it was to receive. More agony, probably, because to the recipient it meant instant oblivion and freedom from all care. His man rebounded from the blow, the drawn truncheon falling from his grip and clattering on the stones. Beyond him stood the now-open gateway into the police yard.

Sayers did not hesitate. Jumping over the fallen constable, he ran through the gateway and out between the screening wagons. A law-abiding man for his entire life so far, Sayers saw little future in trusting to the law now. The law would have him buried for a deed he had not done. Ahead of him lay stabling for horses, with the ostler leading a pair across his field of view. To his left were the main building and the stone archway that led to the street.

The gates were being opened. The Black Maria that had brought him here was on its way out again. As he ran toward it, the sound of a Hudson whistle rose from the exercise yard behind him; as two more shrill notes were added, the one-legged watchman pinned back the gate and the Black Maria started to pass through.

Putting the wagon between himself and the gatekeeper, Sayers used its high sides as cover in the hope that he could slip out along with it. But the Black Maria’s driver had turned in his seat at the sound of police whistles, and saw him right away. With an alarm-raising cry of “Prisoner on the loose!” he leaned right over and lashed at Sayers with his horsewhip. Sayers crouched and raised an arm to protect himself, but the whip was short and cracked harmlessly in the air above his head.

He was right by the wheels, only inches from them as they rumbled over the cobbles. Ahead of him there was about two feet of space between the wagon and the gatepost. The driver pulled hard on the reins, trying to use his vehicle to close up the gap and cut off Sayers’ exit; the horses, surprised and confused by this sudden move, jumped in the traces and clattered sideways onto the pavement instead of out into the road. The wagon swayed dangerously and swung across, so that the side of it ground into the post right in front of Sayers with a sound of splintering coachwork. Sayers had to throw himself back, or be crushed.

The wagon rocked and was jammed at an angle in the gateway, its horses panicking and at least one of its wheels raised up off the ground. Sayers dropped and scrambled underneath it as the watchman came around the back. For a man with but one leg and a crutch, he was moving at a surprising speed.

The watchman was shouting after Sayers, the driver was shouting at his horses, and the horses were rearing in the traces and in danger of destroying the wagon to wrench themselves free. Their hooves came down like riveters’ hammers, striking sparks from the stone pavement, while the robust shell of the Black Maria rocked back and forth like a wardrobe stuck in a doorway. Sayers came out onto the street, touching a hand to the ground to keep himself from falling and feeling a double lance of agony in his arm—once from the sergeant’s disabling blow, and again from his own knuckle-busting punch to the lookout.

As Sayers came up to his feet, the coachman lashed out again with the whip. This time the tip of it caught Sayers across the back, splitting through shirt and waistcoat and the skin underneath. He was so close to the horses that he almost lost his footing and fell under their hooves; but then he was out and running, and leaving their chaos behind.

He’d little idea of where he was. It was a Saturday afternoon street in an unfamiliar town, with trams and wagons and horses and a Saturday crowd. A running man in shirtsleeves would draw attention, for sure; especially a running man with an injured arm and the shirt on his back split in two. He could not be halfhearted in his flight, but knew that he must put as much distance as he could between himself and the police station. He needed to disappear into the byways before any kind of a hue and cry could begin.

After dodging through people on the pavement, he jumped into the road. On the far side of it, barrow boys were pushing handcarts along. Which meant that somewhere close by, there had to be a market.

Caught for a moment between two passing trams in the middle of the road, he skipped along sideways until his way was clear. Then he pressed on in the direction from whence the barrows came.