Solomon's Song

Bryce Courtenay - Solomon’s Song

BOOK ONE

Sydney 1861

On a dull early morning with the cumulus clouds over the Heads threatening rain, roiling and climbing, changing patterns and darkening at the centres, the incoming tide washes a body onto Camp Cove, a small inner-harbour beach within Port Jackson which is becoming increasingly known as Sydney Harbour.

Paddy Doyle, the shipping telegraph operator stationed at South Head, out with his dog hears its persistent and, what seems to his ear, urgent barking coming from the beach below him. He makes his way down the pathway onto the small jetty to see his black mongrel yapping beside what, even at a distance, is plainly a human body lying high up on the wet sand.

Doyle, a stout man not given to exertion, hesitates a moment, then jumps the eighteen inches from the jetty onto the sand and breaks into a clumsy trot, the sand squeaking and giving way under his boots. Commonsense tells him no amount of hurrying will make a difference, but death has a haste that ignores the good sense of walking slowly on a sultry morning. He is puffing heavily by the time he arrives at the wet bundle of wool and limbs from which trail several long ribbons of translucent iodine-coloured seaweed.

Immediately he sees that those parts of the body not protected by clothing are badly decomposed and much pecked about by gulls, crabs, sea lice and other scavengers of the deep. But not until he comes right up to it does he realise the body is missing a head.

The neck of the dead man protrudes from a dark woollen coat, a grotesque stump, ragged at the edges, torn about by the popping mouths of countless small fish. It is an aperture made less grisly by the cleansing effect of the salt water but more macabre by its bloodless appearance. It looks like the gape of some prehensile sea plant designed to trap and feed on small fish and tiny molluscs rather than something made of human flesh and blood.

Paddy, an ex-convict, brought to New South Wales on the barque, Eden, the last transport of convicts to Sydney in November 1840, thinks of himself as a hard man. But twenty years of half-decent living have increased the size of his girth and heightened his sensibilities and he vomits into the sand.

After a fair endurance of spitting and gagging he rinses his mouth in the salt wash and stands erect again, kicking the sand with the toe of his right boot to cover the mess he’s made at his feet.

The sun has broken through a break in the clouds and almost immediately blowflies buzz around the corpse. A sickly stench starts to rise from the body, but with his belly emptied of his breakfast gruel, Doyle is now better able to withstand the smell and he squats down to make a more thorough examination.

A narrow leather thong around the base of the headless neck cuts deep into the swollen flesh and disappears inside the neck of a woollen vest. Doyle, reverting to his darker instincts, tugs tentatively at the cord. At first there is some resistance, then a small malachite amulet, a Maori Tiki, is revealed.

Doyle, like all past convicts, is deeply superstitious and is alarmed by the presence of an amulet known to ward off evil spirits and put a curse on those who harm its wearer. He hurriedly tucks it back under the wet vest, afraid now even to have touched it. Without thinking, he rubs the palm of the offending hand in the wet sand to cleanse it, then crossing himself he mutters, ‘Hail Mary, Mother of God, protect me.’

The body is that of a white male of unusually small stature. The fingers of both his hands are clenched to form puffy, clublike fists. Whether from the sudden heat of the sun or the drying out of the corpse, the right hand begins to open and Doyle observes that the nails have continued to grow after death and are deeply embedded into the fleshy upper part of the dead man’s palm. As the fingers unlock and open there is no sign of blood oozing from the fissures the nails have made. Each finger now wears a hooked talon with the finger pads puckered and raised from the immersion in sea water, so that the skin surface seems to be covered by nests of tiny white worms.

The nails are smooth and clean with no cuts or scars nor is there any permanently ingrained dirt etched into the lines on the palms to indicate a man accustomed to physical work. The skin on his arms is bluish-white from the sea water, but shows no signs of having ever been exposed to the sun. ‘Some sort of toff,’ Doyle thinks, ‘no doubt up to no good and come to a sticky and untimely end, good riddance. Still an’ all, choppin’ off his ‘ead’s goin’ a bit bloody far!’

Later, when he has pulled off his boots and placed them on the stone steps of his hut to dry and dusted the sand from his feet, he telegraphs Sydney to report the headless corpse. Then, in what Paddy thinks is an amusing appendage to his message, he taps out, Best get a move on it don’t take long for them blowflies to lay their maggot eggs.

Two hours later, with the threatening clouds now well out to sea and the sun hot as hades in a clear blue sky, a steam pinnace from the police mooring at Circular Quay with two police constables aboard puffs up to the Camp Cove jetty to claim the body for the Pyrmont morgue.

While searching the corpse, the morgue attendant, observed closely by Senior Detective Darcy O’Reilly of the Darlinghurst Police Station, discovers a small leather wallet inside the jacket. It contains four pounds and several personal calling cards which identify the headless man as Tommo X Solomon.

Detective O’Reilly immediately sends a constable to Tucker & Co. to inform Hawk Solomon that he is required at the city morgue to identify what may be the remains of his brother.

Hawk, at Mary’s instigation, had reported Tommo missing in case any of Mr Sparrow’s lads might have seen him entering his lodgings on the night of Maggie’s death and declared his presence to the police.

A further search of the victim’s clothing reveals a deck of DeLarue cards, the kind generally used by professional gamblers of a superior status. Finally, a gold hunter watch, with the ace of spades enamelled on its outer lid and a sovereign hanging from its fob chain, is discovered in a buttoned-down pocket of his weskit. It has stopped at twenty minutes past ten o’clock. Senior Detective O’Reilly writes this down as the presumed time of death and then pockets the watch. The corpse is left clothed for the pathologist to examine and is lifted onto the zinc dissecting table in preparation for the autopsy by the Chief Government Medical Officer, William McCrea M.D., who will closely examine the clothes before removal, noting any tears or stains that may help to define the method of death.

Conscious of the corpse’s advanced state of decomposition Dr McCrea loses no time presenting his findings to the coroner, Mr Manning Turnbull Noyes, known in the magistrates courts as M. T. Noyes and by the hoi polloi as ‘Empty Noise’.

The hearing and its immediate aftermath is best summed up by the following day’s Sydney Morning Herald report on the murder by its popular senior crime reporter, Samuel Cook. Although Mr Cook’s name is not used in the paper his style is easily recognised by his many readers who know him for his fearless reportage. He enjoys their respect for his ability to ask awkward questions which have a habit of greatly embarrassing nobs and government officials of every rank. Cook has even been known to take on the governor when a wealthy merchant of dubious reputation was included in the Queen’s Honours List. There are some who believe he wouldn’t back down to the young Queen Victoria herself.

Samuel Cook is the scourge of the police force, in particular of Senior Detective Darcy O’Reilly. And while every magistrate in New South Wales, given half a chance to nobble him, would cheerfully sentence the Sydney Morning Herald reporter to a ten-year stretch in Darlinghurst, it is Noyes who would call in the hangman. Like O’Reilly, M. T. Noyes is a special target for his remorseless and acerbic pen.

HEADLESS BODY WASHED UP ON CAMP COVE BEACH

A special report.

The headless body of a white man thought to be that of Mr Tommo X Solomon was discovered yesterday washed up on the beach by Mr Paddy Doyle stationed at the Camp Cove telegraph office. Mr Doyle reported that he

had initially been alerted by the unusual barking of his dog and had walked down to the beach to investigate, thinking perhaps a seal had come ashore on the rocks at the far side of the beach as they occasionally do at this time of the year.

Upon discovering the murder victim Mr Doyle lost no time alerting the authorities and the body, sans head, was recovered by the police some hours later and taken to the city morgue at Pyrmont.

The investigation into the murder is under the direction of Senior Detective Darcy O’Reilly of Darlinghurst Police Station.

Dr William McCrea M.D., Chief Government Medical Officer, successfully applied to the magistrates court at Darlinghurst to submit his findings immediately to the coroner, Mr M. T. Noyes, citing the humid and inclement weather and the decomposed nature of the corpse. Permission was granted by the stipendiary magistrate and the inquest was held late yesterday afternoon.

In his coroner’s report Mr Noyes stated that the head of the deceased had been removed by an instrument thought to be an axe with the blade prepared to a razor-sharp edge.

Senior Detective O’Reilly stated in evidence that, as the victim had not been robbed of his wallet, or his gold watch and chain, he appeared to be the victim of an execution-style murder.

The coroner, well known for his acerbic wit, remarked that in his experience on the bench he had not yet heard of a suicide where the deceased had entirely removed his own head with an axe. He hoped the senior detective might in future restrict himself to any information which might be useful to the constabulary in their efforts to solve the case.

The senior detective then stated that the murder may have taken place on board a ship at sea. However, the more likely conclusion was that the head had been removed from the body and the body taken outside the Sydney Heads and dumped at sea.

‘I would be most surprised if the head isn’t buried deep somewhere ashore, Detective O’Reilly,’ Mr Noyes opined.

The detective sighed audibly. ‘Yes, your honour, we are most grateful for your opinion,’ though what he really thought of the coroner’s gratuitous insight this correspondent dares not even suppose.

The coroner made a finding of murder by person or persons unknown and the court was adjourned.

Asked outside the court who he thought might have done such a grisly execution Senior Detective O’Reilly stated, ‘Decapitation is not a common method of murder, but is known to be used among the celestials. Though I have not heard of it used against a white man before.’

When it was pointed out that the victim, Mr Tommo Solomon, was a user of the opium poppy and well known in Chinatown, he refused to speculate further on the matter.

‘Our enquiry will determine soon enough what we need to know,’ he stated.

‘Did you know that the murder victim was a partner in a gaming syndicate run by the well-known “sportsman” Mr F. Artie Sparrow?’ he was then asked.

‘No,’ came the prompt and surprising reply.

‘Did you know he was a member of a regular illegal card game that was known to take place in Chinatown

on the premises of Tang Wing Hung the Chinaman importer?’

Not entirely surprising, his answer was ‘No’ again.

Your correspondent then asked if the murder of Mr Solomon might be linked with the deaths on the premises of Mr Sparrow’s lodging of the boxing promoter known as Fat Fred and the prostitute Maggie Pye, the latter suffocating under the weight of the dead body of the former.

Senior Detective O’Reilly replied that the coroner’s report on the state of decomposition of the victim’s body supported the theory that Mr Tommo Solomon might have been murdered at around the same time, but that it would be foolish to link the two incidents.

He stressed that the coroner’s findings of the two previous deaths had been that Fat Fred, while involved in sexual intercourse, had died of a sudden and massive heart seizure and Miss Pye of asphyxia while trapped beneath his body.

‘We have no reason to suspect foul play.’ Senior Detective O’Reilly added, ‘We are hoping that Mr Sparrow will help the police with our enquiries but, as of this time, we have been unable to locate him. I ask anyone who knows of his present whereabouts to come forward.’

The good detective was then asked if he thought it a mere coincidence that the murdered man was the twin brother of the professional pugilist Hawk Solomon who, in turn, was betrothed to the murdered prostitute, Maggie Pye?

‘All coincidences will be carefully examined,’ O’Reilly replied loftily.

Your correspondent then asked if Senior Detective O’Reilly was aware that Mr Sparrow was also known to owe Mr Tang Wing Hung and Miss Mary Abacus, the mother of the adopted twins Tommo and Hawk Solomon, a considerable sum of money, this being their winnings from bets made on the prize fight between Mr Hawk Solomon and the Irish pugilist who goes under the

sobriquet, The Lightning Bolt?

Senior Detective O’Reilly declined to comment, but pointed out gratuitously that both barefist boxing and wagering on such contests are illegal in the colony of New South Wales and that no such claim, if true, would stand up in court.

‘Did this not then suggest a reason why Mr Sparrow might have “gone missing” and wasn’t it worthwhile following up the evidence of the lad known as Johnny Terrible, who stated that Mr Sparrow had sent a note to Maggie Pye suggesting she be the emissary between himself, Tang Wing Hung and Miss Mary Abacus?’

‘Sir, you are fully aware that the particular note found on the premises belonging to Maggie Pye was tabled and read out in court. It simply contained the words, Come and see me, my dear, and was signed by Mr Sparrow.’

‘And the evidence of the boy, Johnny Terrible?’

‘The magistrate chose not to take into consideration the boy’s evidence as he has been in trouble before and is known to lie under oath.’

Senior Detective O’Reilly then looked at your correspondent with an expression suggesting some bemusement. ‘I find myself surprised at your questions, sir. Given the known occupation of the deceased woman, the magistrate, I believe, has correctly concluded that she was acquired by Mr Sparrow for the purposes usually associated with women of her profession. The note received by Maggie Pye can possess no other explanation,’ he concluded.