Bruce Alexander - The Price of Murder

I insisted on hearing this from Malachi Simmons himself, and the constable shrugged. It was a matter of indifference to him. He said that the magistrate would be down soon, and he pointed to a bench next to the door and said I might sit there, if I chose.

Only minutes later I heard footsteps upon stairs somewhere deep in the house, and a few minutes after that the constable came and told me that the magistrate would see me. Then: down the two long halls once again and into the chambers of Malachi Simmons. This time, of course, I was much disturbed and not in the least given to accommodating his feelings. In short, I fear I was rather rude.

What I heard from the magistrate was this: About an hour after Mr. Patley and I left him, he was visited by one Stephen Applegate, who described himself as “a friend of Alice Plummer.” He wished to know if she were being held here. The magistrate acknowledged this and acquainted the young man with the charges that awaited her in London. These Stephen brushed aside as lies and half-truths. He dealt, for example, with the matter of child-selling by telling him (as he had no doubt been told by her) that in truth she had believed that she had been giving the child out for adoption. She had not solicited any amount of money in payment for her daughter but had been given it as a reward.

“And I have heard, young man,” said the magistrate, “that your methods of questioning her were highly suspect.” I demanded to know what was wrong with our questioning of Alice Plummer, and he explained what I myself should have realized: One does not fill a witness with gin whilst interrogating him or her. At best, you would be drawing from her unconsidered responses, and, at worst, she would tend to agree with all that was said to her.

Where could he have heard that? Why, of course! Stephen would have remembered that Mr. Patley and I had announced ourselves as guests at the Good Queen Bess. He must have headed there as soon as he was free to leave the stable-and then into the tap-room, where he would have heard the serving woman on the matter of the two glasses of gin, and the innkeeper, of course, must have tipped young Applegate on just where he might find his Alice.

I attempted to defend my methods, telling the magistrate that she was drunk before ever we asked a question of her.

“And so you attempted to make her drunker, did you? No, young sir, I fear that won’t do at all. Not only did Stephen Applegate present a good case against you and your methods, he is also from a very old family here in Newmarket. They’ve owned and run that stable for as long as anyone can remember. Of course I would take his word over yours. He paid her fine, and he took her out of here. That was about an hour or two after you left last evening.”

“But-”

“No buts! Out of here now, or I’ll throw you into the same cell she had.”

I had no choice but to leave. But, I believe, I ran all the way up to the Good Queen Bess without stopping. Indeed, I’m sure I did, for I remember that when I attempted to explain the situation to Mr. Patley in our room, I was so out of breath that I could do naught but begin again after I had properly caught my breath. I ended with a shout: “We must find her again!”

“Well, the first place to look,” said the ever-practical Mr. Patley, “would be where we found her in the first place.”

And so, as soon as Patley had dressed and made himself otherwise presentable, we started up the hill to Applegate’s stable. Stephen seemed to be waiting for us, so sure that we would be coming round to see him that he had not even sought the darkness at the rear of the place. He was leaning upon the door as we approached, his pitchfork within easy reach (just the thing for driving away the unwanted). He had a proper smirk upon his face.

“Good morning to you,” said he. “I’m sure I know who you’re looking for and why you’re here.”

“Well,” said I, “where is she?”

“She ought to be in London by now.”

“You sure about that?”

“Just about as sure as I can be at this distance.”

“You have any objection to us taking a look around?”

“No, go ahead, but you’d do better to check the list of passengers on the post coach that left last evening around nine. But go ahead, suit yourself. I’ll wait right here.”

We looked, of course. If we had not, we would not have seemed to be searching seriously for her. We even climbed the ladder in the rear and tramped through the hay in the loft-without success, of course. Nor was I surprised at that, for Stephen’s indifference was not feigned. It was plain that he was confident we would find no trace of her. Mr. Patley was of the same mind.

“It don’t look like she’s here, does it?” said he.

I shook my head. “No, it doesn’t. We should go and check the passenger list as he dared us to do, but I’m sure she’ll be on it.”

We climbed down from the loft and headed out of the place.

Stephen silently watched us go. But then, thinking better of it, he called after us as we started down the hill.

“I tried to get her to stay. Told her I could hide her so you’d never find her. But she said no. There was something she had to do in London.”

I turned and nodded, yet I certainly would not thank him.

“No reason not to go to the big race now,” said Mr. Patley. “Come to think of it, I’d better go and place my bet whilst I still can.”

I didn’t ask him how much he was betting, nor on which horse, yet I was greatly curious about one thing: “Mr. Patley, are you hedging your bet?”

He looked at me a bit sheepishly. “No, I’m not. The little fellow’s got me convinced that the two of them can really do it. I’ve got ten pounds, the last of my mustering out pay, on Pegasus to win. But what about you?”

’Twas then my time to look embarrassed. “No, he’s convinced me, too-and those odds!”

“I know,” said he. “They’re just irresistible.”

Again, just as at Shepherd’s Bush, there were so many horses entered that it was necessary to run the race in heats. Pegasus was in the first heat of the day, which meant that he was running against a field of horses that, the odds said, had no chance in the final race of the day. Still, Mr. Deuteronomy held him so in check that Pegasus did not win outright but rather placed second. (Three from each heat would compete for the King’s Plate in the last race.) Yet Pegasus had qualified, and that was all that had been asked of him, and the horse had more than two hours in which to recover himself.

The course was oval and about a mile in length. It was proper to walk a horse once round it after he had run. Deuteronomy walked Pegasus thus much at least, then trotted him round a time or two. It seemed that in the next couple of hours the horse was never completely still except when Mr. Bennett was massaging his legs.

“You see what they’re doing, don’t you?” said Mr. Patley, as always my guide in this new world.

“I think so,” said I. “Deuteronomy seems to be running exactly the same sort of race that they ran last week at Shepherd’s Bush.”

“That’s right. And he’s keeping Pegasus warm and loose without tiring him.”

No one else had seemed to notice the technique they employed, yet once it was explained to me, it appeared to be both sensible and necessary.

As Mr. Patley amplified his earlier comments, he pointed out that the favored horses raced in the last heat before the final run, so they were warmed up and ready to go when the last race of the day came. If Pegasus were to have a chance at the King’s Plate, he would have to be as properly warmed up as any that had run in the previous heat; and it appeared that he was. Yet he would also have to achieve this racing peak without having tired himself out. Mr. Deuteronomy, in his green and white racing colors, was proving-to us, at least-that there was more to jockeying than sitting on a horse.