A Thief in the Night (20 page)

Tardow was the son of an elementary school teacher, and by the age of thirty he had a business of his own. He had seen the potential of waste products in an Industrial Revolution and he had found uses for trash, refuse and any number of throwaway substances and created markets for them.

However, his reputation did not end with the effluents of society. He also created great, national commercial organisations and lobbied Parliament for the promotion of radical schemes to alter the face of the land. Then, in 1881, when still a young man of only forty-three, he invested in railways, and soon found himself to be one of the richest men in the land. It seemed that the man who was born in the year of Victoria’s coronation was destined to epitomize the age of prosperity, an era which produced The Great Exhibition and subdued the Indian Mutiny; constructed a steel industry and built locomotive tracks across continents.

In the autumn of 1891 Tardow was on the verge of joining Parliament, as a Gladstonian Liberal, with the elections looming the following year.

And he was happy, until, one cold morning in January 1890, when his servant brought the post to the breakfast table. His wife, Floriana, was still in bed, suffering with a headache. He opened the first letter – a handwritten note – and read:

Rich Man Sir,

Time the world of London knew about Flo don’t you think?

Who she was, and her former (oldest) profession. She knows me.

Ask her about Theo Sachs. Ready money would keep your secret.

Flo knows where I am.

Tardow was a man who prided himself on his self-control and discipline; he let memories of Paris seduce him away from his mounting anger. He saw her face, heard her laugh, felt her kiss as if it were happening again. His Floriana, named after the German composer, Robert Schumann’s imaginary character, Florestan. It had been a courtship of dances, parties, and long evenings when too much drink was taken but in which poems, songs and laughter filled the air. He had been twenty-two then, and love had found a place in his life for the first time.

She had arrived in his life with a chuckle of amusement, as he sat alone in a café, scribbling in his diary. She had asked what he was writing. He had been affronted at this breach of good manners, but then remembered he was in Paris, and asked her to sit with him. He ordered coffee. By that evening they were holding hands and he was on the verge of making promises.

The dream dissolved as she came into the room and said good morning. He rose to kiss her cheek and asked if she was feeling better. Inside, a thousand questions were bubbling up.

‘Oh
ma chere
, when I see you I am well!’
She helped herself to eggs and mushrooms from the sideboard, and sat down opposite him. Her grey eyes and auburn hair had brought spring, he thought, into January. The servant brought her tea.

‘Flora, my love, may I ask you a question? Do you know a man called Theo Sachs?’

He could see by her face that she did. She dropped the fork she had just picked up with a clatter onto her plate. Tardow picked up the letter and passed it across to her.

‘I’ve … I’ve given him money, John! He knows all about me.’ He could see tears welling up in her eyes and she dabbed at them with her handkerchief. ‘I should have told you … but … but …’

‘You thought he would go away.’

‘I gave him fifty pounds, and then another fifty pounds. He promised he would leave me alone after that. I hate him!’ She spoke the last words with venom and slammed her hand down on the edge of the table.

John tried to comfort her, reassuring her that everything would be all right. But they both knew that the past had blown into their contented lives like a chill wind on a summer’s day. When finally they sat down to talk, away from the servants, Flora, kneeling on the carpet at the side of Tardow’s armchair, held his hands and looked up into his face with teary eyes.

‘John, the Floriana Daria you met all those years ago … I was always honest with you … I told you all about my life, yes? You know my other name … my professional name?’

‘Of course my dear. I feel confident that I know all about you. We neither of us has secrets.’

‘This man, Sachs, he will say the most terrible things about me. He will tell the press that I am … was … a harlot.’

‘My love, he will never be believed,’ soothed Tardow.

His wife suppressed a sob. ‘John, the papers will call me a
courtesan
. Everyone will know that I have a past … a past that any woman would feel ashamed of.’

‘We’ll talk no more of this today. I shall walk to the office, as usual. You must meet your friends for the lunch you planned. I promise you that I will end this!’

They tried, with a supreme effort, to pretend that there was no problem, that nothing was capable of shaking the balance and order of their world together. But two days later a second letter came.

Mr Tardow,

Further to my letter the other day, you know that your dear wife knows where to find me, and I expect £200 to be delivered to that address within the next 48 hours. Should this not happen, I will be pleased to tell the newspapers all about little Meg Caley of Spitalfields, and how she was so skilled in entertaining Gentlemen.

More than a mere threat hangs over you. I have made a statutory declaration with a magistrate. Therefore any rash action from you will lead to a confirmation of your infamy and indeed of your living a life of deceit and hypocrisy.

Mr Theo Sachs, solicitor.

Tardow decided to pay the man a call, soon finding his address now that he knew he was a solicitor. The office was what he expected: a dingy, neglected box of a place a few streets behind Covent Garden.

When Sachs saw the loping gait of a tall man dressed with the same elegance as a lord of the realm, he sensed that the man he expected was here at last. Tardow did not even knock at the door. He strode in, eyes fixed on Sachs, who was sitting behind a desk heaped with paper. Tardow’s imposing figure cast a shadow over the desk, and the short, round-bellied man sitting behind it flicked back a coif of oily hair and instinctively straightened up.

‘How good of you to come Mr Tardow.’

‘I ought to throttle you here and now, you snake!’

‘Albert!’ Sachs called out, inclining his head back towards what appeared to be no more than a cupboard. Behind him a door creaked open and a child of perhaps thirteen peeped out. ‘Yes Mr Sachs?’

‘You are able to hear everything we say in here?’

‘Course Mr Sachs. I ain’t deaf!’

‘Good, now carry on with that copying.’

Tardow slammed his cane against the man’s desk, making him start.

‘Easily frightened, Mr Sachs? Well, that is not the case with me. I have brought no money, and references in your note to a statutory declaration mean not a jot to me. I suggest you crawl back into the noxious hole you crawled out of and forget your dreams of milking me or my wife for any more money. It will not happen!’

Sachs leaned back and licked his lips. ‘Delicious woman, that girl. I knew her once; what was she called, now what was it … oh yes, Meg Caley … lived in Spitalfields, daughter of a poor weaver on hard times. She was, shall we say,
extending favours
, to save dear Pa from the workhouse. I did appreciate those favours, Mr Tardow.’ He gave a soft sigh and pursed his lips. In a second, Tardow’s cane had swung out and rapped him sharply across the face. There was a scream of pain and Sachs fell from his chair, clutching his cheek. From the door Albert was craning his neck to look into the office. ‘You saw that assault?’ Sachs screeched at the boy. ‘You saw him strike me?’

‘Goodbye Mr Sachs. You will not hear from me again. But should you approach me – or my wife – one more time, you can expect more of the same.’

Tardow felt sure that fear would rid him of the nuisance. But he was wrong.

‘Here it is in the bleedin’ paper,’ he said to himself, taking another swig from the whisky bottle. ‘This is my man.’ He put the page of newsprint to his lips and kissed it. Then he staggered to his feet, checked his face in the cracked mirror by the sink and laughed. ‘Private Garvey, Sir, reporting for duty,’ he said with a salute. Looking back at him was a shaggy mop of black hair flecked with grey, a ruddy face, swollen eyes and a stubbled chin.

He took a few steps, grabbed a bayonet case from the sideboard, and sat down again, drawing the blade out and running his finger over it. ‘Jack Garvey, still removing scum from this piss-pot of a world. It ain’t no Christian place like my Pa said … no, no, no. It’s a fallen world … fallen. There’s devils out there needin’ to bleedin’ die.’

He let his head sag backwards onto the back of the armchair and let a memory in. He was ahead of his escort. It was 1882 and they were in a Kashmir valley in Gilgit. Accompanied by some Ghurkas and Pathans, he ordered all but his guide, the Khazi from Dir, to walk ahead and survey the next bend in the valley. He was about to speak when he heard movement behind, turned, and saw the Khazi throwing his breech-loader away, about to take his sword. He did this in seconds and ran at Jack, ready to thrust the blade into him. He floored the man with his fist, and as the Khazi tried to run off, he tackled him and held him down flat. Then his Ghurkas came to help. It was a close-run thing.

Coming round again, he thought of the next assignment. ‘Ah Sergeant Bayonet, you will earn the corn, settle the Lord’s dues,’ and he allowed the deep guttural rattle of a drunken laugh to engulf him.

Lord George and Harry Lacey were playing chess in the library of the Septimus Club. Strangely for Harry, he was insisting on chatting during the supposed silence when concentration was required before the next move was confirmed. George usually won, but Harry had been improving lately. ‘I think I ought to talk on strychnine on Friday, George. Excellent subject … a number of cases I could refer to. Course my doctor has told me to play more cricket, and the match with the Writers’ Eleven should be just the thing.’

‘Do stop prattling Harry, I’m feeling combative and wish to thrash you. Anyway, what you talk about at the Oriental dinner is immaterial. The Septimus brains will be distinctly dulled by the time you stand up and play the Professor.’

‘You may be right. But the cricket match … I understand that Conan Doyle and his friend Alf Mason will both play … dashed good batsman, Mason.’

There was a shout of triumph. ‘Checkmate! Got you again, Prof!’ George beamed and took a cigarette from his case, but he did not light it, as at that moment Smythe brought in a red-faced visitor. ‘Mr John Tardow, My Lord.’

Greetings were exchanged and soon Mr Tardow was telling his story to two attentive listeners.

‘This requires the utmost discretion, My Lord, and er … Professor Lacey.’ They nodded. ‘As you may know, my wife is … well, you have no doubt read the papers this last week.’

‘Yes, but we treat them as purveyors of fantasy, Mr Tardow,’ said Harry.

‘Right … well, you seem to be aware of my situation. What you will not know gentlemen is how deeply I love my wife, and how, although the allegation that we lived together out of wedlock for a few years is true, and indeed although her early life was a rack of torment applied by poverty, we love each other very much. When I met her I was a young man with ambitions and little knowledge of the fairer sex, you understand. As time wore on, she became the most precious thing in my life. When this vermin appeared and threatened to take everything from us, I acted rashly.’

‘Rashly? Please explain,’ said George, interested.

‘I went to his office and, well, I struck him.’

‘Oh dear,’ said Harry.

‘But that is not the worst of it. I have, I fear, done something extremely foolish.’

‘Oh dear God, what have you done?’ asked George.

‘I have hired a killer,’ Tardow whispered, with a shifty look around the room. But there were only two other men in the library: the Earl of Clannmore was deeply asleep and the Earl of Backforley was deranged and dreaming of his days in Basutoland.

‘
What
? By the shooting stars of heaven, you surely have not?’ hissed George. Harry, who had been sipping his brandy, spluttered out ‘Blood and sand!’