Archie's Battleflat Adventures: The Harriman Mystery (26 page)

“
Coins Brentwood then took to London and spent.”

Oswalde
nodded. “Only the more he spent, the more he wanted to spend and he
suddenly found the coins weren’t being made fast enough to keep up
with his demands. He insisted on more coins being made faster but,
for some reason, Harriman refused. Then the gold supply started to
run out.”

“
Mr Harriman – a forger?”

Oswalde
nodded slowly. “Brentwood here employed Harriman, who used his
blacksmith skills to smelt the coins. A mere blacksmith wouldn’t
suddenly have a stash of guineas lying around, so they made a deal.
When all of the gold was minted, Harriman would receive a house in
lieu of payment, where he could remain for the rest of his days, or
sell it and live off the proceeds.”

“
Mr Harriman’s cottage?” Archie’s brows rose. No wonder Mr
Harriman had always looked unhappy. Spending hours and hours
slaving over a hot furnace, casting hundreds of coins, and when you
had finished you were left with a rundown old hovel on the
outskirts of Battleflat.

“
No wonder Mr Harriman hated you,” Archie muttered, shaking
his head chidingly at the man standing opposite.

“
But he was a labourer. He worked over at the farm. Was he
casting coins as well?” Jack frowned, trying to envisage the shy
and often withdrawn Mr Harriman being involved in anything so
underhand.

Oswalde
shook his head. “Not while he was here, as far as we know. We found
the casting equipment – or some of it, in Harriman’s lodgings at
Brentwood’s house. But there are a lot of questions
unanswered.”

“
Just because the man was involved in casting coins, doesn’t
mean that I was involved in it too,” Brentwood protested. “I had no
idea what he was doing. He was employed as a gardener, that’s all.
You have nothing on me.”

Archie
took the opportunity to open the pouch and produce the rolled up
parchments. Oswalde immediately moved forward to take the papers
off him, and silence settled over the room’s occupants for several
moments while the papers were read.

“
What does it say?” Archie asked, when he couldn’t stand the
suspense any longer.

“
It confirms that although Brentwood’s bank account was empty,
he managed to clear his debts – large debts – several times over.
With money he supposedly didn’t have. He has no known source of
income. People in London have been raising questions as to where
the money and riches came from, but nobody was able to get any
answers from Brentwood here.”

“
It’s nobody’s business,” Brentwood snorted
arrogantly.

“
It is when it is breaking the law, and results in someone’s
murder. There are also accounts of how much Roger Harriman made,
and when the coins were handed over to you,” Oswalde muttered,
lifting a grubby piece of parchment to read the back.

“
But why Mrs Humble? I mean, what did she do?”

“
Nothing, Archie,” Oswalde replied. “She was going over to Mr
Harriman’s house for some reason – we think maybe to see if she
could find anything that would identify Mr Harriman’s fictitious
sister. Unfortunately for Mrs Humble though, she disturbed
Brentwood here and probably started to ask questions he couldn’t
answer.”

“
So he killed her.” All eyes turned accusingly on Brentwood,
who glared unrepentantly back at them.

Eyeing
the parchment in Oswalde’s hand seemed to make Brentwood realise
there was nowhere to go. But although his shoulders slumped wearily
in defeat, his eyes remained locked on the rolled up papers held in
Oswalde’s hand.

“
You have no evidence.” Although the words were defiant, they
were weak, as though doubt had already begun to grow in Brentwood’s
mind.

“
I saw you, along with another of my officers, Brentwood. We
arrived just as you were dragging her body through the woods. When
you realised someone was nearby, you dropped her in the woods and
left.”

“
Leaving her body in the woods?” Archie gasped, staring in
disgust at Brentwood.

Oswalde
nodded sadly. “If we had only been a few minutes earlier we
probably could have saved her, but as it was -” he shook his head,
regret clear on his face.

“
But why put her back in her cottage?” Jack asked, enthralled
by everything that was being relayed before them.

“
Because we didn’t think she deserved to be left to rot on the
forest floor and deserves a grave. We wanted to shake Brentwood up
a bit – you know, poke him a bit into making a rash move that would
reveal his identity, but we hadn’t anticipating Archie to step in
and push things along a bit.”

Jack
puffed out his cheeks. “Who are you?”

“
We are Bow Street Runners. We have been sent by the Lord
Chief Justice to ensure Brentwood here is brought to the Tower to
face trial for not only being involved in stealing the gold in the
first place, but for forgery.”

“
The Lord -” Jack gasped, slumping down onto his
chair.

Oswalde
grinned. “The Lord Chief Justice is determined to bring this
renegade down.” He turned toward Brentwood. “Brentwood here is
being stripped of his title as we speak. Because of the debts he
has once again run up, it looks like he will also be stripped of
his estates and everything that goes with them, which will be sold
to pay off his debts while he is in jail awaiting
sentencing.”

“
Did Brentwood steal the gold all by himself?” Edward gasped,
flushing brightly as all eyes turned toward him in surprise. In
reality, he had been standing so still that everyone had forgotten
he was there. He was still struggling with the thought of the
snobby aristocrat skulking around at night, carry out such an
audacious crime, and the question just couldn’t be contained any
longer – he just had to know.

“
No. He paid some men from the docks to do it for him. Men who
are now in the Tower awaiting trial.”

“
But how did he pay them if he didn’t have any
money?”

“
They were paid when the gold was cast into coins. Brentwood
borrowed from creditors and paid the men just enough to get them to
do the job, with the agreement that the rest would be paid once the
coins were cast. It was only the large amount of money involved
that persuaded the dockmen to do it.”

“
So the gold was stolen, taken to Shropshire where Harriman
cast it into coins. Has the gold run out completely now?” Jack
asked, wondering how Brentwood had planned to support himself once
the coinage ran dry.

“
We think some of it is stashed somewhere by Harriman, but we
don’t know where.”

“
Brentwood has it,” Archie declared firmly, casting a spiteful
glance at Brentwood who shot him a filthy glare.

“
Shut up, boy! You can prove nothing,” Brentwood
snarled.

“
Check the parchment,” Archie replied wisely, rocking back on
his heels and feeling inordinately proud of himself.

“
I have seen enough of the parchment’s contents, Archie, to
know we have enough to send Brentwood here to trial and he will be
found guilty,” Oswalde declared, rolling up the parchment
officiously. In reality though, until he studied the parchments
closely for any hidden clues, there didn’t seem to be any
information on where the rest of the gold was stashed. Until then,
the dates, times and quantities Harriman had detailed before his
death were enough to send Lord Brentwood to the gallows.

Archie
frowned.

“
But if Mr Harriman didn’t have a sister, where did he go
every Sunday?”

“
He met his contacts in Melton Mowbray and handed over a pouch
or two of newly cast coins. We were able to follow the contacts
back to London. It is how we have managed to crack the ring of
thieves Brentwood here employed. They have told us enough about
what they were paid, who their employer was etc. In addition to the
information these parchments contain, we have more than enough to
put Brentwood before a judge.” Oswalde glanced toward Brentwood.
“You
will
be
found guilty. The evidence is damning. There is nowhere to go, and
nowhere you can hide, Brentwood, so you may as well give it
up.”

“
I’m not giving you a damned thing,” Brentwood snarled,
choosing that moment to lunge across the table at Archie and the
bag still clenched tightly in his hand.

The gun
Lord Brentwood was still holding waved wildly around the room,
holding everyone still. They watched in frozen horror as one long
arm wrapped around Archie’s neck, dragging him toward the sitting
room door.

Brentwood’s eyes locked on Oswalde’s.

“
Get your man out there to come in here,” Brentwood demanded,
nodding toward the front of the house where the third man must be
waiting.

“
You will never escape from us, you know that, Brentwood,
don’t you? Give the boy up, he has done nothing to you."

“
He has been a thorn in my side for far too long and it is
about time I shut him up once and for all.”

“
Why? So I can’t tell everyone that it was you who tried to
break into our house the other night? That you have been watching
our house for days, and waiting for us to go to bed so you can
break in? Or that you have broken into Mr Harriman’s house to look
for the evidence, and gold? Or that –”

“
Shut up!”

The arm
around Archie’s neck tightened painfully, lifting him just a few
centimetres more off the ground. Archie refused to be cowed by the
man behind him though, and stubbornly slumped against the arm,
making it harder for the man to carry him.

“
Get the man in here now!” Brentwood bellowed, waving his gun
toward Oswalde. Archie could see the blunt tip of his finger
quivering on the trigger and felt a wave of panic begin to build.
He knew in that moment that Brentwood wasn’t bluffing, he wasn’t
going to drop Archie so he could make a quicker getaway as soon as
they got out of the house. This was a stone cold killer, who was
quite prepared to do whatever it took to ensure his freedom –
including murder.

Archie’s
mind began to race and he stared at the end of the gun now faced
away from him. He had one chance, and one chance only. Could he do
it?

He
wasn’t sure, but he knew that if he didn’t take the risk, he could
very well go the same way as Mrs Humble and Mr Harriman. It was the
thought of the two bodies that gave him the strength. His arm was
stiff from holding the heavy weight for so long. The heavy weight
that everyone – including Brentwood – appeared to have forgotten
about.

Although
the arm was still tight about his neck, his arms were free. Placing
one hand on the thick length of muscle and bone, he suddenly swung
the heavy weight of the bag backward.

“
Duck!” he shouted to Edward. He saw the brief flash of
Edward’s astonished eyes as he narrowly managed to duck out of the
way of the large green bag Archie suddenly swung around in a high
arc. Dragging it up and over his shoulder, he was rewarded by the
painful crunch of the bag hitting Brentwood in the face.

Bang!

Archie’s
ears rang at the loud retort of the gun, as the arm around his neck
suddenly vanished. Pandemonium reigned for several
moments.

He stood
in stunned amazement as, all at once, the sitting room door behind
him burst open to reveal one of the men who had run to the
graveyard. Oswalde’s associate. He immediately kicked Brentwood’s
hand. With a loud roar, Brentwood watched as the gun suddenly spun
across the room.

Everyone, except Oswalde and his associates, Brentwood and
Archie, dived for cover.

Brentwood cursed a volley of foul language and spun around,
landing a heavy punch on the man behind him.

Oswalde
lunged across the room, snatching the gun up. Tucking it into his
cloak pocket, he stood back just in time as Brentwood landed on his
back in the middle of the kitchen table. The blood slowly trickling
from a cut on the corner of his eye was of little consequence to
Brentwood, who now lay unconscious in the middle of the
room.

“
Well, that was interesting,” Archie declared, shaking his
head in amazement.

It was
then that he took a look around the room and started to laugh. His
snickers were accompanied by the smothered laughter of Oswalde and
his men, now that the danger was over.

Marjorie
was cowering behind the sitting room door, which wasn’t anything to
laugh about, except that she couldn’t fit behind the door because
of the cupboard there. Her booby-doobs protruded from the wooden
surface, rendering her hiding place absolutely useless.

Emilie
and Betsy had decided to try to climb under the sofa, only the
small two-seater wasn’t big enough for both of them, so they were
left kneeling on the sitting room floor, heads under the sofa, and
their bottoms sticking up into the air like targets waiting to be
hit.

Edward,
Sammy and Ben had tried to hide behind Archie’s dad, Jack, only in
their haste to get behind the tall, reassuring bulk of an adult,
had knocked him clear off his feet. All four of them now lay in a
tangle of arms and legs. With Sammy, Ben and Edward all lying on
Jack, who was gasping for air, only couldn’t breathe to ask them to
get off. The strange grunts coming from his reddened face were of a
language Archie had never heard before.