Bruce Alexander - The Color of Death

Yet Sir John, having heard all, must have suspected that something was amiss, for he said to Frank, “Tell me, young sir, how did you manage to elude the mob once you were in St. James Street?”

“Ah well,” said he, “that was rather a complicated matter. No doubt Jeremy could explain it better.” Though he sounded assured and confident in his manner of speech, the look in his eyes was uncertain, almost fearful.

“Jeremy?”

“If it’s exactitude you seek, sir, it may take a while to work it out.”

“Later, perhaps.”

“If you don’t mind.”

Then did Sir John return to Frank Barber. “And how did those in this crowd, which became a mob, come to suspect you to be one of the robbers?”

“Why, it was a matter of color, sir. As I understand it, this gang of thieves present themselves as Africans.”

“You doubt that they are?”

“I am not convinced of it.” There was, in his manner of speech as he spoke these words, something almost arrogant. It was as if he were putting the burden of proof upon Sir John.

“Leaving that aside, you are convinced that it was only because of your color that you were abused and pursued by the mob?”

“Well …” He hesitated. “There may have been something else. There was something I said did not please them well.”

“And what was that? “

He cleared his throat, took a deep breath, and plunged ahead. “When one of them, I forget which, referred to me as an African, I told them that I was no African but as much an Englishman as any one of them.”

“Indeed that might not sit well with them,” said Sir John dryly.

“They grew angry at that. And when I asked them which of them had served in the Royal Navy, as I had, they grew angrier.”

In spite of himself, Sir John fell to chuckling at that. “My service in the Royal Navy never won me much respect.”

The two might have gone on in this way for quite some time, for they had begun to warm one to the other. But then the door to Bow Street opened, and in came a surprise. It was Robert Burnham in the company of Mr. Fuller. I knew that as the day man and jailer, Mr. Fuller was the only constable Sir John had at his disposal, and so he was sent out from time to time to bring in prisoners, or those wanted for interrogation who might resist or come only reluctantly. It seemed, oddly, that one or the other might be the case in this instance, for while Mr. Burn-ham was not in chains, Constable Fuller did indeed have a firm grip upon his arm. And Fuller wore, as he always did, a brace of pistols.

“Mr. Fuller, is that you?”

“It is, sir,” came the response.

“You have Mr. Burnham with you, I can tell. Did he give you any difficulty?”

“A bit. He was about to ride off somewheres, and I had to convince him that talking with you was more important than going for a ride of a Sunday.”

“Nothing violent, I hope.”

“Nossir, I just had to speak to him right sharp, is all.”

“Mr. Burnham?” It was the first time he had addressed him directly.

“Yes, Sir John?”

“Is Mr. Fuller accurate in what he says? You were not hurt, or treated roughly? And you came, more or less, of your own volition?”

“I’m here. I’m not hurt. I’m not in chains.”

“Good. Then you 11 be in good fettle for a little tete-a-tete.”

I happened just then to glance at Frank Barber, who stood quite close to me. The look of shocked astonishment upon his face was quite striking, for it expressed something personal — disappointment so profound that it was as if he were looking upon his fallen captain. I had not known, nor had I any reason to suspect, that Frank and Mr. Burnham were even acquainted, but obviously they were.

“Mr. Fuller, I must ask you to place Mr. Burnham in the strongroom while you and I talk briefly.”

“Gladly, Sir John.”

If Mr. Fuller was thus pleased by this, Mr. Burnham certainly was not. He did not physically resist, but his eyes shouted a loud protest as the great key was turned in the lock.

“Jeremy!” Sir John, who stood in the doorway to his chambers, called back to me. “I should like you in here, too.”

As I trailed Mr. Fuller to where Sir John waited, I wondered at Mr. Burnham’s status. If he were a prisoner, he was certainly being treated with deference by the magistrate. And if he had been brought in merely to be questioned further, then why was it necessary to lock him in the strongroom?

I glanced back at that wooden-barred cage as I entered Sir John’s chambers and saw Frank already deep in whispered conversation with Mr. Burnham.

“Come along, Jeremy.”

“Yes sir,” said I, and took my usual place in the chair opposite Sir John with his desk between us. Mr. Fuller preferred to remain on his feet. He stood a space away, wearing his usual frown, his arms folded across his chest.

“I really haven’t much to say,” declared Sir John in a low voice, “but I wish to create the impression in Mr. Burnham’s mind that we have a good deal of new information to discuss, so we need not hurry through this. If you have any questions, by all means ask them. If you have anything to add, by all means add it. You first, Mr. Fuller. Tell us, if you will, just what transpired when you visited the Bilbo residence and collected Mr. Burnham.”

Constable Fuller utterly lacked all power of abridgement. His tendency in making any sort of report ran exactly counter to that of tight-lipped Constable Brede. Where details had to be drawn out of Mr. Brede, they flowed endlessly abounding from Mr. Fuller. While this suited Sir John well, particularly in the circumstances he described, it might indeed try the reader’s patience if I were to attempt a literal copy of the constable’s remarks. To put it another way: Since he refused to abridge, I feel obliged to do so in what follows.

Mr. Fuller had been shown through the house by Jimmie Bunkins, for whom the constable has a special dislike stemming from Bunkins’s days as a young thief. He was fairly certain that an alarum was passed on to Mr. Burnham, who vacated the house while it was searched. What neither Bunkins, nor any of the rest expected, however, was that Fuller would have some knowledge of the place (given him by Constable Bailey, chief of the Bow Street Runners) — enough to know where the stable was located and how to reach it. He sought it out on his own, and found Mr. Burnham trying to saddle the mare without the aid of the stable boy, who happened to be visiting home that day. Burnham had it near done by the time the constable arrived, so that he made a brave attempt to mount the horse and ride out of the stable. But alas, because he was seldom called upon to saddle his own horse, he hadn’t pulled the saddle-girth quite tight enough, and in the act of mounting, saddle and all came down upon him as he fell upon his backside. Though Mr. Fuller helped him to his feet, he was unkind enough to laugh at him as he did it. This provoked an angry exchange between the two men: Mr. Burnham demanded that the constable help him saddle up again, and was told that he had no need to do so, for he was going to Number 4 Bow Street to see Sir John Fielding. Mr. Burnham then said that he was far more eager to see what awaited him at the end of the ride than he ever would be to see Sir John. And on and on they went, the matter between them never resolved, until Mr. Fuller simply ordered Mr. Burnham to return the horse to her stall and come along with him to Bow Street. He emphasized his directive by toying with the grip of one of the pistols he wore, though he swore that he never actually took it from his holster. Without further ado, the horse was tended to, and the two men set off together to see the magistrate.

To tell that story to Sir John — complete with details and digressive excursions — took near ten minutes. Even Sir John, who had an apparently inexhaustible hunger for minutiae of every sort, was a bit overwhelmed by this, so that when he turned to me, he had but a question to be answered.