Carver's Quest (30 page)

‘I am more than willing to hear you out, Mr Brindle, but I must insist that you leave hold of me.’

The publican grinned again and dropped Adam’s arm.

‘No offence intended, Mr Carver. It is Carver, ain’t it? Old Jinks mentioned your name.’

Adam brushed the sleeve of his coat where Brindle’s sweaty fingers had impressed themselves on the material.

‘You knew Jinkinson well?’ he enquired.

‘Poor old Jinks.’ Despite his words, the fat man looked serenely untroubled by the private investigator’s departure from the world. ‘Known him for years. ’E’s
been coming down the Cat since you was just a young nipper caterwauling in your ma’s arms.’

‘So he knew you well enough to confide in you?’

‘Don’t know as ’ow you’d call it that. But ’e often come to the Cat when he wanted to lie low for a bit.’ Brindle shrugged. ‘ ’E paid me well
enough for the room so I ain’t going to be too partickler about what he wants to lay low from.’

‘And that’s why he was with you tonight?’

The publican nodded.

‘Turned up a couple of nights ago. Said ’e needed a room to stay in to keep out of trouble. Someone was after ’im, ’e thought.’

‘After him?’

‘That’s what ’e says. Somebody like yourself. Of a gentlemanly nature.’

‘I cannot believe that it was I he feared.’

‘No, you ain’t much for anybody to fear,’ Brindle agreed. ‘Not even for Jinks.’

‘Did anybody visit him while he was with you?’ Adam asked, ignoring the implied insult. He began to wonder whether he and Pulverbatch had misjudged the publican. Perhaps there was no
further mystery about Brindle’s motives for sheltering Jinkinson. He did it because he had known the enquiry agent for many years and Jinkinson paid him money for the room. The Cat and
Salutation was like Bellamy’s Lodging House. A refuge when Poulter’s Court became a place to avoid. ‘Did he see anyone other than your regular drinkers?’

The fat man shook his head. ‘Didn’t even see them. ’E spent all ’is time up in that room above the billiards. Didn’t come out until an ’our before you
arrives. Then ’e goes out for a walk. Needs some air, ’e says.’

‘And returns at the very moment that I was speaking to you and Toby.’

‘That’s about the size of it. ’E must ’ave panicked when ’e saw you. Runs out but ’ooever was after ’im was waiting further along the river. You know
the rest.’

The two men had left behind the quiet alleys in which the Cat and Salutation lay hidden and now emerged in a busy and well-lit thoroughfare. Even at this hour, wagons, carts and cabs, both
pouring into the city and out of it, streamed past them. Adam peered to his left, looking for landmarks he might recognise. Was this, he wondered, the Ratcliffe Highway? His knowledge of this part
of the city was so regrettably poor, but he assumed that it was.

‘Now I got that pig Pulverbatch and his little band of piglets swarming all over my crib,’ Brindle went on, raising his voice to compete with the noise of the passing traffic.
‘And that ain’t something I appreciates.’

‘The inspector is investigating a murder, Mr Brindle. I doubt he’s interested in your assorted crimes and peccadillos.’

‘You’re as green as duckweed, ain’t you,’ the publican said, almost admiringly. ‘It’s the killing as don’t interest Pulverbatch that much. One body more
or less pulled out of the river ain’t goin’ to worry him. Especially some private sniffer on ’is uppers like old Jinks. But ’e’s been itching to find a reason to come
grubbin’ around the Cat and now ’e’s got one.’

Adam decided directness was his best policy.

‘What if the murder of Jinkinson was connected to the murder of another person? A person of greater social standing?’

‘You mean that cove in ’Erne ’Ill?’ Brindle asked, enjoying Adam’s look of surprise. ‘Oh, I know about ’im. I know Pulverbatch ’as got Ben Stirk
lined up for a bit of dancing on nothing down Newgate way as well.’

‘You know Stirk?’

‘Let’s go over there,’ the publican said, gesturing towards a shop doorway further along the highway where a shabby vendor had set up his steaming potato can earlier in the
evening and was still standing, close to half past midnight, in the hope of trade. ‘I could do with a bite of supper. And I’ll let you know what else I knows.’

After a minute, Brindle had been served his food, hauled from the can and then sprinkled liberally with salt. Holding the potato in his right hand, he blew on it three times and then bit
vigorously into the brown skin and white innards. Between mouthfuls, he continued to speak.

‘First thing you ’ave to remember, sonny, is that Pulverbatch ain’t about to admit ’e knows next door to bugger all about this ’ere killing in ’Erne
’Ill.’ Brindle sprayed small fragments of hot potato in Adam’s direction. ‘That’s a place full of coves with plenty of ready. When someone gets topped in a neck of the
woods like that, ’e knows ’e’d better find a daisy-brain to take the drop as soon as ’e can. Otherwise all ’ell will be bustin’ out. That’s where poor Ben
Stirk comes in.’

‘So Stirk is no more than a scapegoat?’

‘Ben’s just the nearest dumb gawk that Pulverbatch can lay ’is ’ands on. ’E’ll end up sold like a bullock in Smithfield.’

Brindle took a last bite of his potato and threw the remaining bits of skin over his shoulder.

‘If that is the case,’ Adam said, ‘we must do something to help him.’

The publican waved a fleshy arm in dismissal of the idea. ‘Ain’t a thing as
can
be done,’ he said, picking at his teeth.

Adam was about to dispute this but Brindle held up his hand to silence him.

‘Second thing you need to know,’ he went on, ‘is that old Jinks didn’t have no visitors at the Cat. But ’e did send out a message. Paid Toby to trot ’alfway
across town to deliver it.’

‘A message to whom?’

‘I ain’t at all sure why I should tell you this. Maybe it’s on account of I’m too kind-hearted.’ Brindle smiled like a crocodile scenting its lunch. ‘Maybe
it’s because I could do with Pulverbatch out of my ’air. And this might be a way of arranging it.’

The publican pulled an old silver turnip watch from his waistcoat pocket and took a swift look at it.

‘It’s a-getting late, Mr Carver. Time for all of us saints and sinners to be in bed. So I’ll jest tell you one last thing and then I’ll be off. Old Jinks, ’e sent a
message to a very important gent. An even more important gent than your good self. ’E sent word to an MP, did Jinks. An MP called Garland.’

With that, the publican raised his chimney-pot hat and then waddled off in the direction of the river.

* * * * *

It was eight o’clock on the following morning and Adam had recovered some of the spirit which his adventures in Wapping had knocked out of him. Sitting at the breakfast
table as Quint busied himself in the kitchen, he was looking through what the day’s first post had brought him.

‘A bill from some importunate tradesman. In all likelihood my tailor, who will have to be paid soon before he decides that he has no alternative but to involve the law in our business
transactions. A communication from my cousin Richard. Probably news of distant relations about whom I neither know nor care. Or possibly a begging letter. In either case, it can be safely ignored
for the present. Something from my publisher. Unlikely to be good news.’

Adam sifted quickly through his correspondence, throwing the letters one by one to the far end of the table. He held the last one up to the light from the window, looking more closely at the
inscription on it.

‘Aha, I do believe I recognise this handwriting.’

‘Ain’t another from that young tart what come calling here the other week, is it?’ Quint called. ‘The one you went dancing with at some twopenny hop?’

‘Cremorne Gardens, Quint. We took to the dance floor at Cremorne Gardens, not some twopenny hop. No, it is not. The postmark looks to be Cambridge. And speak more respectfully of Miss
Maitland. She is a lady, not some trollop you might find parading down the Haymarket. No, the day before yesterday I wrote to Professor Fields.’ Adam brandished the letter and shouted over
his shoulder. ‘Today I have his reply. I am invited to my alma mater to meet with him. You will, of course, accompany me.’

Quint, entering the room and handing Adam a plate of devilled kidneys with mushrooms, looked less than thrilled by the prospect.

‘I ain’t so sure old Fields’ll want to see me again. If you recall, last time he saw me, he told me I was a damned rogue.’

‘Well, so you are, Quint, but your friends have never allowed that fact to stand in the way of their affection for you. If
you
remember, Fields called you a
rogue—’

‘A damned rogue,’ Quint insisted.

‘He called you a damned rogue because, on the night before you and I were to leave the expedition and sail from Salonika, you stole a pouchful of his favourite tobacco.’

Quint watched solemnly as Adam picked up his knife and fork and began to attack his breakfast.

‘I ’ad no choice,’ he said, mustering what dignity he could. ‘There were nothing else but that Turkish filth to be ’ad. I deserved a good smoke before we
sailed.’

‘That was not how the professor saw matters, but I am sure that he has now had time to forget – or at least to forgive – your misdeeds. More than two years have passed since we
departed from Salonika.’

Quint looked less certain that his theft of the tobacco was now consigned to the realms of history.

‘So, we’re off to Cambridge, are we?’ he said. ‘And what are we a-going to do when we gets there?’

‘There are questions to ask the erudite professor. Including, of course, the question of the mysterious Euphorion of whom we have heard so much.’

‘ ’Ow the devil we going to get there?’

‘You speak as if I were proposing an expedition in search of Dr Livingstone. We have only to look in
Bradshaw
to discover the times of the Cambridge trains. And now, if you
please, Quint, I would be grateful if you would cease your questioning and allow me to enjoy these excellent devilled kidneys you have provided.’

‘If that’s what you wants,’ the manservant said, although clearly he continued to harbour nothing but doubts about the wisdom of an excursion out of town.

‘It is,’ his master replied, and turned his attention exclusively to his breakfast.

F
ast, ain’t it,’ Quint said, peering out of the carriage window as the Hertfordshire countryside raced past.

‘On some railway journeys the delays are such that you rid yourself entirely of the restless spirit of the age. But on the London to Cambridge run…’ Adam left his sentence
unfinished, thinking that the speed of the train spoke for itself.

‘What we doing exackly, charging out of town like this?’ Like most Londoners, Quint was deeply suspicious of the world beyond its streets and thought that all that life offered could
best be enjoyed within hearing distance of Bow Bells.

‘We are heading, I hope, in the direction of enlightenment.’

The grimace on Quint’s face suggested that he thought they were unlikely to reach their destination very easily.

‘I ain’t so sure why we need enlightening. Why don’t we just turn our backs on everything and go back to taking sun-pictures of old buildings like we was doing
before?’

‘The train is slowing. We are coming into a station,’ Adam said, leaning forward in his seat and peering ahead. ‘Royston, I think.’

The train was indeed arriving in a station. The first-class carriage in which Adam and Quint were travelling juddered and came to a halt at the platform. A man and a woman, well-dressed and
prosperous-looking, approached the carriage door but stopped when they saw it was already occupied. Adam raised his hat politely. The man did the same and reached for the door handle. The woman,
who was gazing at Quint with the kind of appalled fascination that visitors to the Zoological Gardens bestowed on the monkeys there, tugged swiftly at his arm.

‘We shall look for another carriage, Henry,’ she said, and the two moved further up the platform.

‘I’m disappointed in you, Quint.’ Adam was accustomed to the effect his manservant often had on his social betters and felt no need to make any remark on the couple’s
behaviour. ‘Two men are dead. We cannot just carry on as if nothing had happened.’

‘We ain’t got no real business with dead men, though. We just had the bad luck to find ’em. Why’n’t we leave it to Pulverbatch to lay hands on whoever killed
’em? He’s already got that Stirk cove.’

‘Mr Stirk could not have killed Jinkinson. Even the inspector recognises that, since he was holding him in custody at the time I was stumbling across poor Jinks. And, despite what
Pulverbatch says, Stirk is about as likely to be the murderer of Creech as I am. As the Archbishop of Canterbury is.’

‘What we planning on doing then?’

‘We are doing more than planning, Quint. We are already turning our minds to the curious events that have overtaken us.’

With another judder, the train began to leave the station. ‘Let us consider what we know and what we can deduce. And a few leaps of deductive reasoning are surely acceptable.’ Adam
settled himself deeper in his seat. ‘When I sat beside him at the dinner at the Marco Polo, Creech spoke to me of a manuscript. Of a manuscript which, he claimed, holds a great secret. A
secret which rests in the hills of Macedonia. He wanted my assistance to discover the secret. A week later, you and I made our way to Herne Hill to visit Creech.’

‘But he was already croaked.’

‘Croaked, indeed. And when we found Creech, we also found a notebook.’

‘It was me what found it,’ Quint pointed out.

‘As you say, you were the man who laid hands upon it and let no one try to take the credit from you. However, the importance of the notebook lies not so much in the identity of its finder
as in what it contained.’

‘Jinkinson’s name. And word of all them comings and goings by the toffs.’

‘In addition, there was the word “Euphorion” written in the middle of one of the pages in Greek script.’ Adam had slipped further and further down the seat until he was
almost staring upwards at the roof of the carriage. ‘So, Jinkinson was employed by Creech. For purposes not yet entirely clear.’