Bruce Alexander - The Price of Murder

At this point, Mr. Bennett stopped. He breathed deeply a time or two, as if to gain control of himself, then did he set his jaw before continuing. “The next part,” said he, “is hard to tell.” Yet he managed, by stopping from time to time, wiping his tears before they became a problem, and clearing his throat as necessary.

“So we got there to the big house,” he resumed. “I carried her to the door, and the housekeeper came and took her from me. I heard no more of her or from her for quite some time, two weeks at least. But then at night I began to hear weeping; just the sort of tears to break you heart. Then there was nothing more until, toward the end, there was some screaming. Deuteronomy here didn’t hear none of it because it was always at night that the tears and the screams came, and by that time he was back here in the Haymarket. There was this one night it got terrible bad, just before Easter. But then it stopped, and somehow or other that seemed even worse.

“They sent somebody down for me, and right at the door I was met by the housekeeper, and she takes me upstairs. She unlocks the door, and she takes me inside what seemed like a child’s room, a-what is it they call it? — a nursery. There was toys, dolls and such, all over it. The bed didn’t seem to have nobody in it, just blankets and a pillow. Only then, the housekeeper lifted up the pillow, and there was Maggie, the little girl I picked up on London Bridge. Dead. ‘Who done this?’ I asked the housekeeper. And she gave me a kind of smirk, and she says, ‘Who do you think?’ She took a blanket and wrapped the body in it, even covered her face up. Then she presents it to me. ‘Here,’ says she. ‘Lord Lamford wants you to dispose of this.’ I’d no choice but to take it from her. I went back to the stable, saddled up a horse, and took the trail to the river. There’s a place upriver with a shallow bank. I threw Maggie’s body into the Thames right there, and kept the blanket, as I was told to do.”

Having said his piece, Mr. Bennett halted. He pulled from his pocket a kerchief and blew his nose loudly upon it.

“When we came up with that ticket for the pistol at Griffin’s,” said Deuteronomy to me, “I was naturally pretty curious, because I could remember the very day that Bennett was sent off with it. As he said, we were just starting to train Pegasus for racing.”

“Did you confront him with it immediately?”

“No, I started to work on him, though. It wasn’t till the journey back from Newmarket that he started to see things my way. I told him to talk to you-tell you the story-then you could sort of prepare the way for him with Sir John.”

“I ask him, could I trust you, and he said he’d trusted you with all his winnings,” said Mr. Bennett to me. “I don’t know what laws I’ve broken, but I know I must have broken some, but what I did in getting rid of the body ain’t nothing compared to what Lord Lamford did in killing that child. But what I done has been on my conscience something terrible.”

“When did you begin to suppose that the little girl you picked up on London Bridge was Mr. Deuteronomy’s niece?” I asked.

“Well, he told the tale of Maggie disappearing and then his sister going off somewheres, and I began to wonder because the times matched up pretty fair. And then Deuteronomy showed me the dueling pistol I’d left off for repair and said the woman who had the mate to it-Katy Tiddle-lived in a room next to his sister and Maggie. But now Sir John Fielding had it and considered it property to do with the investigation of Katy’s murder.” Then he wailed: “Oh, how did I ever manage to get in with that drunken whore?”

Bennett was so disturbed by the rhetorical challenge he had offered himself that I thought it likely that he might break into tears once again. Though he did not, I thought it wise to get him to Sir John immediately.

“I fear your confession will be useless unless you make it direct to Sir John. Why not come with me now? He would, I’m sure, listen to you, no matter what the hour.”

“Alas, I cannot. I think it likely that I might not return from such a trip. If I’m to go to Newgate, I shall need all my money to bribe the guards. I’ll go back and gather together what I can and return on the morrow soon as ever I can.”

“Must we do it so?” I asked. “I can virtually guarantee that you would not be sent to Newgate, but rather to the Fleet.” I saw that made little impression upon him. I could not persuade him to go with me to Bow Street, and so I did urge him to come in the morning, if at all possible, all to no avail. He repeated that he would come soon as he could. He stood, bade me goodbye, and, pocketing the pistol, made for the door. Deuteronomy bounced out of his chair and accompanied Bennett to the door. There they exchanged a few words and Bennett left.

“Well, what did you think of that?” Mr. Deuteronomy asked me.

“Why, I believed him. Did you not?”

“I’ve known him for two years, and I’ve yet to hear a lie pass his lips.”

“When did you hear this from him?”

“’Course I suspected ever since I saw that pistol, but it was just last night on the drive back from Newmarket that he told me all. He’s been carrying a terrible burden for over a month.”

“I can see that,” said I. “He seems a man haunted by guilt.”

And so did I return to Bow Street, quite bursting to tell Sir John of what I had just heard from Bennett. Yet upon my arrival, I discovered that it was far later than I had supposed. Past midnight it was, and not a soul awake in our upper floors of the court. I had not heart to wake anyone to tell them, though, I confess, the thought did cross my mind.

Next morning, I was up at my usual early hour. I set the fire and lit it and waited a bit impatiently for Sir John to appear. He arrived last of all. As he sat down, I told him eagerly that last night I had heard news that would materially affect the prosecution of the Maggie Plummer case. He took that in his stride and suggested we talk about it just as soon as he had given adequate attention to his breakfast. He was not to be hurried. When at last he had finished, I sought to persuade him to go upstairs to his study that we might talk freely and without interruption. (That remark earned me a look of great annoyance from Clarissa.) Yet he thought it proper to hold our talk in his chambers. There we should find peace and quiet aplenty, said he, and be on hand should Mr. Marsden, his clerk, require anything of him. You will not be astonished, reader, to learn that we headed directly to Sir John’s chambers.

I had barely begun to relate Mr. Bennett’s speech when a series of familiar sounds announced the arrival of William Murray, Earl of Mansfield, the Lord Chief Justice. First was there the slamming of the door to Bow Street, which was followed by the sound of Lord Mansfield’s heels clicking along the corridor, and then, last of all, Mr. Marsden’s vain attempt to persuade the visitor to allow the clerk to announce him to Sir John. Lord Mansfield would have none of it, of course, for in the next instant, he fair exploded through the door and into the magistrate’s chambers.

We awaited him upon our feet: I, respectfully ready to surrender my chair to him, and Sir John already offering his hand. Lord Mansfield accepted Sir John’s hand and gave it a wiggle, but he declined my offer of a chair. He would remain standing (so, naturally, Sir John and I had also to remain upon our feet).

“This won’t take long,” said he.

“What then?” said Sir John. “How may we serve you m’lord?” There was an unmistakable touch of irony in that. Lord Mansfield ignored it.

“I have stopped here on my way to Old Bailey to ask why in the world you did not return an indictment against that woman, Mother Jeffers? She is, as I understand it, naught but a madam, a keeper of bawds in a house out in Clerkenwell. Is this correct?”