The Gold Masters (3 page)

‘That’s my little girl, Catherine Mary!’

PC Lane had struggled out of the pew, and was making his way rapidly to the front of the temple. His face was as white as chalk, and his frantic voice showed that he had thrown off all prudence. One or two men in the audience sprang up, and physically restrained him from climbing on to the platform.

‘That’s my little girl, I tell you! That’s what she called me: Dada. Polly was the name of her little doll. We put it in with her … And she’s with her great-grandmother, Theodora. She can’t say it
properly
, she’s not three yet. Let me talk to her!’

The woman on the platform stared at PC Lane with no apparent sign of recognition. She sagged in her chair, and for a moment it
looked as though she would faint. Mrs Pennymint suddenly appeared from behind the rear curtain, and began whispering rapidly in her ear, while gently stroking her forehead. Madam Sylvestris sighed, and sat up straight.

‘Thank you, Minnie,’ she said, ‘I’m all right now. Poor man,’ she continued, looking now at PC Lane, ‘your outburst closed the door between the two worlds, and left your little girl’s question unanswered! I am so sorry for you. Perhaps you would like to come to my home in Belsize Park for a private sitting?’

‘A sitting, ma’am?’ PC Lane’s voice had steadied. There would be no further outburst from him.

‘Yes. It’s just another word for a seance. I am quite sure that Catherine Mary will come through if you are there, and perhaps you will see her materialize. I’m sorry that the direct voice upset you so. But it is a great wonder, a great miracle, for which we should be thankful. See Mr Portman at the end of the service. He will give you my address. Oh, and there will be no fee. Your assent to the teachings of spiritualism will be all the payment I shall need.’

In a private dining-room of one of the sumptuous gentlemen’s clubs in Pall Mall, a convivial luncheon was reaching its
conclusion
. The dessert plates had been removed, and a very old, fine claret had been produced, its appearance heralding a tattoo from appreciative fingers on the round table. There followed a scraping of matches, and the lighting of cigars.

The host was a fine-looking, hearty man in his mid-fifties, a man with a ready smile and a penchant for sudden bursts of loud laughter. He boasted a fine head of black curls, which made him look younger than his years. He was dressed formally, in clothes that suggested ‘banker’, but there was a certain jauntiness about him, and about the brilliant red rose in his button-hole, that denoted a man who was something more than a mere toiler in the City.

Lord Jocelyn Peto drew on his cigar, and glanced round the table. His guests were all busy talking to each other, their tongues loosened by the magic of superb food and the choicest wines. That was all to the good, for these gentlemen had been invited to lunch for the purpose of striking bargains with each other. Why do
business
in a poky office when you could do it in style, in Pall Mall?

Old Forbes there was discussing the details of a loan to young Everett. How the old devil smiled, and how the young rake misread that smile for disinterested kindness! Oh, well, all was fair in business. Tom Weinstock was whispering earnestly to Sir Abraham Goldsmith, who was pretending to listen. Tom wanted Goldsmith to amalgamate their two banks; this was a pleasant way of getting Tom to realize that Goldsmith wasn’t interested!

They were all welcome, here, at his club, or out at his home in Croydon. Some of these men had been friends of his from
school-days
at Eton, others were the comrades of a lifetime in business as principal of Peto’s Bank in the Strand.

A slight frown crossed Lord Jocelyn Peto’s brow as he thought of the man waiting patiently to see him downstairs in the
smoking-room
. Damn the fellow, couldn’t he have called at the bank, or, failing that, summoned him, Peto, to that rarefied Renaissance palace of his in Blomfield Place? No; he was content to wait, like an errand boy, downstairs, until this jolly lunch was over! A typical mean manoeuvre by Sir Hamo Strange to make him feel guilty and gauche. Well, he could wait until all this claret had been consumed, and the good company dispersed.

As Peto’s mind dwelt further on his old business rival, he suddenly smiled, and then laughed out loud. Dear me! Poor old Strange! Not everything was going to fall effortlessly into the lap of the man they called ‘moneylender to kings and princes’. Sometimes, the best laid plans of mice, men, and international financiers, went awry. Oh, well, he’d better go downstairs and see what the fellow wanted.

‘My dear Sir Hamo!’ cried Lord Jocelyn. ‘How good of you to call on me here at the club! You had only to say the word, and I would have presented myself at Medici House.’

Sir Hamo Strange smiled, and it seemed to Lord Jocelyn that his smile was like a cloud passing over the sun. He had bade his guests conclude their lunch at leisure, and had hurried down to the all but deserted smoking-room.

‘It’s no trouble, I assure you, Lord Jocelyn,’ said Sir Hamo Strange. ‘I only called, really, to ask whether you’d send me written confirmation of your willingness to oblige the Bank of England with six hundred thousand sovereigns. The Governor will want paper guarantees, as I know you’ll appreciate.’

Lord Jocelyn Peto carefully moistened his lips. It would not do to let this walking skeleton see that his mouth had gone dry.

‘Certainly. I’ll have my secretary type out a guarantee, and a messenger will take it round to Threadneedle Street later this
afternoon
. Six hundred thousand … For how long, did you say?’

‘I didn’t. And neither did they — the Bank of England, I mean. But I suppose it’ll be the usual six months. These government loans usually run to that.’

Each man watched the other. Neither gave anything away. Old enemies, they had long ago taken each other’s measure, and acted accordingly.

‘I suppose it hasn’t got to be all sovereigns? I mean, I have a hundred thousand in Austrian schillings still crated and between lead foil. That’s my only holding in foreign gold. Everything else under the Strand is coin of the realm.’

‘Schillings will do very well, I’m sure, Peto. None of your gold is going to be unpacked. It will just lie in the vaults of the Royal Scandinavian Bank until such times as the Swedish Government feel confident enough to return it. Well, you know that without my telling you.’

Sir Hamo Strange picked up his silk hat and cane from the floor as though to take his leave, but then apparently thought better of
it. He leaned forward confidentially.

‘There’s something else I want to tell you, Peto. You and I have been friendly rivals as collectors of rare and unusual things for many years now. Well, I know you’ll be pleased to hear that I have just acquired the Ferdinand and Isabella Polyglot Bible. The only one of its kind. Congratulate me, Lord Jocelyn!’

Sir Hamo Strange closed his eyes, savouring the deliciousness of the moment. Peto had been after that book for longer than
he
had. According to Sudermann, he had sent an emissary hotfoot to Count Fuentes, but he’d got there too late. Yes, he’d pipped Peto to the post this time. He opened his eyes. Lord Jocelyn Peto was still smiling.

‘My dear Strange, I’m so glad!’ he cried. ‘We both coveted that book, so I’m happy to know that one of us, at any rate, has secured possession of it. I expect you employed Aaron Sudermann?’

‘Yes, yes, I did. I must say, Peto, that I’m pleased at your response. I thought you’d be vexed.’

‘Not at all. I sent a man of my own, you know, a man who’d also tracked the Bible to its hiding place in Spain. But there: I was too late. Perhaps you’d let me call some time at Medici House to inspect the volumes? I suppose you’ll have them authenticated?’

‘Yes, indeed. I’ve a man coming down from Cambridge to look at them. He’s bringing an epigraphist with him. Perhaps I’ll arrange a little reception … I’ll send you an invitation.’

‘Thank you. An epigraphist, hey?’ Lord Jocelyn laughed, and shook his glossy curls merrily. ‘Well, I look forward to seeing your latest treasure. As for the Swedish loan business, I’ll send that note round to the Bank this afternoon. Meanwhile, I must say farewell to my guests. Goodbye.’

Sir Hamo Strange sat alone in the smoking-room of Peto’s club, wondering what lay behind his rival’s assumed careless
indifference
. For it
must
be assumed. Peto had toiled for years trying to track down that unique edition of the Polyglot Bible. But then,
he’d had plenty of time to prepare his response, as his man would have dashed post haste from Spain to tell him of his failure.

That was it. Peto was pretending indifference simply to annoy him. That would be typical. A shallow buffoon of a man,
struggling
to understand the subtleties of the financial markets from his vantage point on the heights of the aristocracy. His palatial bank in the Strand, his reputedly vast wealth — all had been inherited. He was an amateur in business, and a dilettante in the serious vocation of collecting. Well, over the matter of the Polyglot Bible he’d met his match.

‘Williams,' said Lord Jocelyn Peto to his coachman when he
eventually
left his club, ‘I shan't go back to the bank this afternoon. I've some private business to transact. Take the carriage back to the Strand coach house.'

Lord Jocelyn watched his carriage until it had disappeared from sight round the corner from Pall Mall into St James's Street, and then hailed a cab.

‘Belsize Park, cabbie,' he said. ‘Put me down at the corner of Melbourne Avenue and Prince Albert Road.'

He settled back on the musty upholstery, and closed his eyes. It was a long haul from St James's to the prosperous suburb of Belsize Park, but it was decidedly worth the journey. Madam Sylvestris always made him welcome….

What a fascinating woman she was! No one knew much about her history, apart from the fact that she was a young widow — well, youngish — and that her late husband had been a scion of the Romanian Royal Family. That's what
she
claimed, anyway. Not that it mattered a fig. Nor did her claim to be a spiritualist medium. What mattered was that Madam Sylvestris knew how to soothe away the cares of jaded businessmen like himself.

Lord Jocelyn Peto fell into a light doze, from which he was
jerked awake by the cab's lurching as it passed out of York Gate and into Regent's Park. They'd be there, soon. He wondered whether she had appreciated the gleaming new brougham that he had purchased for her, together with a fine black horse to match its sable smartness. She had nagged him for over a month about her need for a small, smart carriage, and her conduct towards him had made it a good bargain as far as he was concerned. Almena Sylvestris was an expensive hobby – very expensive, if the truth be known. One of these days he'd have to talk to her about the need to make economies. But not yet. No, not yet.

Lord Jocelyn left Madam Sylvestris's elegant house in Melbourne Avenue at just after four o'clock. The road was deserted, except for a tall, distinguished man with a waxed beard and moustaches, who was peering through tinted spectacles at the noticeboard of a redbrick Methodist church. He was wearing a rusty-looking frock coat, and wore a silk hat that had seen better days.

Lord Jocelyn walked to the cab rank in Eton Road, climbed sedately into the first cab, and told the driver to take him across the river to London Bridge Station. It was time to go home to Croydon. As soon as the cab had left the rank, the man with the waxed beard, who had been sauntering nonchalantly behind Lord Jocelyn, jumped into the next waiting cab, which moved out into the road, and kept close to the noble banker until he arrived at London Bridge.

At London Bridge Station, Lord Jocelyn, who was a director of the Brighton and South Coast Railway, showed his gold badge, and was ushered to a first-class carriage on the waiting train to Croydon. As they began their journey through the drab
manufacturing
district of Bermondsey, Lord Jocelyn closed his eyes and lapsed into a gentle doze. He'd stay like that until they came to Forest Hill, with its pleasant prospect of neat villas reposing in gentle countryside.

Poor, wretched Hamo Strange! What a rude shock he was in
for! He'd been tempted to tell him the truth, but it would be much more amusing to leave him in complacent ignorance until he found out the reality of the business himself. Strange was as rich as Croesus, but what a common fellow he was at heart! Everything in that vulgar house of his was new, or bought second-hand from sale rooms. The man had no pedigree.

Lord Jocelyn missed Forest Hill, but his eyes opened as they were passing the magnificent Crystal Palace, towering on its eminence at Sydenham, 200 feet above the track to the right.

Confound the Royal Scandinavian Bank! Why should it have chosen to panic in July, of all months? It had been reassuring to be approached by Strange to make up the consortium, but it was going to be a near thing – a very near thing. He could have declined in perfect safety, but Strange would not have forgotten. Well, there was no real cause for concern – but it would be a near thing, a very near thing.

At Norwood, the train gathered speed, and Lord Jocelyn, dismissing the articulated skeleton and his doings from his mind, let his thoughts dwell on the comforts of Duppas Park House, his elegant mansion in Croydon, on his wife, dull, worthy Lady Marion, and on his flighty daughter, Clemency.

Marion was incorrigible, long given over, body and soul, to good works of the most depressing kind. It was lucky that she'd never been of a jealous temperament, otherwise she might have put spies on him to see where he went when he claimed, several times a month, to be kept all night at his offices in the Strand. It would not do, for poor, plodding Marion to find out about visits to the fascinating and magical widow out at Belsize Park.

Clemency, still only twenty, was supposedly ‘finishing' in Paris, but he suspected that she was, in fact, enjoying herself hugely in the fast set surrounding the young Marquis de Montfort. Well, let her. She was her father's daughter, and he was amused, rather than angry, at her constant pleas for sustaining cheques. He had a shrewd feeling, born of his natural affinity with his daughter's
temperament, that she would choose to remain in Paris for good.

As for Strange – well, let him go to the Devil, together with his money-grubbing cronies! There was more to life than rooting round in the corners of bank vaults, looking for spare crates of coin.

Confound the Royal Scandinavian Bank! It was going to be a near thing on Friday the twenty-eighth – yes, a very near thing.

‘Up here, Box, if you please. I shan't keep you more than ten minutes.'

Box had hurried into the vestibule of 4 King James's Rents just after eight o'clock on the morning of Tuesday, 18 July, to find Superintendent Mackharness waiting for him on the landing at the top of the stairs. He must have seen him from the window of his dark front office on the upper floor of the Rents, as he'd crossed the cobbles from Whitehall Place.

‘Sit down there, will you, Box, while I glance through these letters. Then I'll tell you what I want you to do.'

Box regarded his superior officer with a judicious mixture of affection and apprehension. Mackharness was well over sixty, and afflicted by occasional bouts of sciatica, which had given him a more or less permanent limp. His yellowish face was adorned with neatly trimmed mutton chop whiskers. He was a neat man, dressed in a black civilian frock coat, which made him look rather like an elderly clerk in a counting-house. Box thought that he deserved better accommodation than the gloomy, lopsided chamber, smelling of stale gas and mildew, that he was obliged to occupy.

‘Now, Box,' said Mackharness, putting aside the last of his letters, and fixing his subordinate with a steely eye, ‘I've called you up here to tell you that, in ten days' time, there's to be a movement of bullion from a number of City banks; to be precise, a
consignment
of specie worth four million pounds—'

‘Strewth! Four million? Specie, did you call it, sir?'

‘Yes, Box. Specie means current coin of the realm. Bullion's too
vague a word, though to most people it means gold and silver bars. My grandfather once saw a wagon laden with silver bars in the forecourt of Rothschild's bank in St Swithin's Lane. But this is specie – gold sovereigns, you know.'

Mackharness tapped the scuffed leather surface of his massive old desk with a large, spatulate finger, while regarding Box with an almost abstract air of speculation. Arnold Box said nothing. He looked at the superintendent's cluttered mantelpiece, and then at the massive rectangle of vacant space above it, where a top-heavy full-length portrait of Sir Robert Peel had hung until recently. He wondered what had become of it.

‘So that's it, Box,' Mackharness resumed, ‘yes, indeed. But what was it I wanted to say? Oh, yes. “Strewth”. I've said before that you should try to find some more elegant epithets to use when you feel compelled to utter an exclamation. To the fishwife, or the costermonger, such infelicities are no doubt commonplace: they sit ill upon the person of one of Her Majesty's police inspectors.'

‘Sir—'

‘Well, just bear what I say in mind. There's no need to
apologize
. You'd better come with me now to Room 6, where I've set out my plans for this operation on the twenty-eighth. Scotland Yard will only be at the periphery, as the actual movements will be supervised by the City of London police, a couple of special
officers
from “A”, and the dock people. But where we are concerned in the matter, Box, the Governor of the Bank, and the Commissioner, will look for efficiency, discretion, and success.'

Superintendent Mackharness heaved himself up from his desk, and lumbered out into a narrow, echoing passage to the right of the landing. Box followed him.

Room 6 resembled a company board room, with long,
baize-covered
tables arranged in a horseshoe. The walls were hung with flyblown portraits of previous commissioners of the Metropolitan Police. The missing Sir Robert Peel was propped up against the wall in a dark corner.

The tables were covered with a massive map of London, a huge canvas affair, its surface yellow with varnish. It served as a kind of table cloth for Mackharness's beautifully drawn route maps, to which were attached instructions and comments in his bold copperplate writing. Rulers and magnifying glasses lay where the superintendent had left them on finishing his task. Box sat down at one of the tables, and listened while Mackharness explained the details of the coming operation.

‘This four million pounds in gold, Box, is required by the Royal Scandinavian Bank to bolster their holdings. For various reasons, the Bank of England doesn't want to transfer its own specie, and has called in Sir Hamo Strange to raise a private loan. He did this in the space of five days, calling in five prominent bankers to assist him. Sir Hamo Strange is advancing one million pounds of his own gold. This will be moved from his private bullion vaults at Carmelite Pavement, which is on our side of Blackfriars Bridge. One of the two men from “A” – in fact, Constable Lane, who assisted you at that business in Back Peter Street – will be on duty at Sir Hamo Strange's vaults, where he is well known.'

The fat finger pointed to a spot on one of the hand-drawn maps. Box saw the double dotted lines that indicated the tunnel passing under the Embankment to Carmelite Pier, Sir Hamo Strange's private landing-stage.

‘All the other consignments will be moved in secure vans hired from Chaplin's, the carriers at Victoria. Each van will have a City of London policeman up on the box with the regular driver. The vans will proceed to five separate destinations along the river, where steam launches will be waiting. A launch will also be standing with steam up at Sir Hamo's private landing stage.'

‘So there will be six steam launches, sir? Won't that be a strain on the River Police?'

‘They'll be private launches, Box, hired for the occasion from Moltman & Sons, who have a fleet of specially strengthened vessels used for conveying very heavy cargoes at speed along the
river. These special craft will be provided at the expense of the consortium.

‘Now, very briefly, I'll take you through the details of the other five bankers in the consortium, insofar as they affect our policing on the twenty-eighth. Each of them is putting up six hundred
thousand
pounds. The first is N.M. Rothschild, at New Court, in St Swithin's Lane. You'll see my proposed route on that plan over there – Cannon Street, across Upper Thames Street, into Swan Lane, and so to Swan Lane Pier.

‘The second banker is Sir Abraham Goldsmith, at Old Change Court, south of St Paul's, just off Carter Lane.' Mackharness described the short but tortuous route that would take Sir Abraham's gold sovereigns down to Queenhythe Steps, close to the Middlesex end of Southwark Bridge.

‘I wondered what to do about the next bank, Brown's of Lothbury. I was tempted to combine their consignment with that of Rothschild's, as the two banks are virtually neighbours. But it's better to be safe than sorry. So Brown's van will go out of Lothbury, into Old Jewry, then Cheapside, and along New Change Lane, skirting St Paul's. It will then cross Upper Thames Street, and end up at White Lion Stairs, on the City side of Blackfriars Bridge.

‘The two remaining banks are simpler propositions. Thomas Weinstock & Sons are in Fenchurch Street, so it's a fairly straight route for their van to take them out beyond London Bridge at Grant's Quay. Peto's Bank is in the Strand, which means that their consignment can simply proceed down Surrey Street to Temple Pier.'

Superintendent Mackharness sat back in his chair, and permitted himself a little smile of self-congratulation. Box pulled the various plans towards him, and studied them in silence for a while. Really, he thought, the guvnor's first rate at this kind of work. There were six separate hand-drawn plans, one for each of the journeys, and a seventh, which depicted a great arc of the
Thames stretching from their own stamping-ground at Whitehall Stairs to Tower Bridge. The river had been tinted a pale blue, and the six moorings where the special steam launches would be waiting were clearly marked in red.

‘Take those drawings away, will you, Box, and make yourself familiar with them. I don't anticipate any trouble, but it's as well to ensure that we understand fully what will be happening on the twenty-eighth.'

‘I suppose this will be mainly a task for the City of London Police, sir?' asked Box. He was beginning to wonder why he had been made privy to Mackharness's clever scheme, but knew better than to ask. A subtle approach always worked well with Old Growler.

‘Oh, yes, Box, it's a matter for City, as it was when something similar was done in '90. That, as I recall, was another of Sir Hamo Strange's financial manoeuvrings. But, as I said, the Home Secretary and the Commissioner both feel that Scotland Yard should be involved in matters involving a foreign power.'