Sally Spencer: Blackstone and the New World

Meade looked up, then stood up so quickly that he almost knocked the table over.

‘Good afternoon, Clarissa,’ he said, almost with a gasp.

The young woman who had so quickly reduced him to this state was perhaps a year or two younger than he was. It would have been stretching the truth somewhat to say that she was a pretty girl, but even the least charitable of men could scarcely have avoided describing her as ‘sweet’.

‘This is Miss Clarissa Bonneville,’ Meade said to Blackstone. ‘Clarissa, may I introduce you to Inspector Sam Blackstone, a famous detective from England.’

‘Charmed, Mr Blackstone,’ the girl said, holding out her hand for him.

‘My pleasure,’ Blackstone replied, wondering if that was the correct etiquette in America.

‘We seem to see so little of you, these days,’ the girl said to Meade.

‘That’s true,’ Meade agreed. ‘Perhaps we could. .’

Another woman had suddenly appeared at the table. She was older and stockier than Clarissa, and her face was pure vinegar.

‘You are keeping our guests waiting, Clarissa,’ she said sternly.

‘I only wanted a few words with Alex, Mama,’ the girl protested.

‘I am sure that Mr Meade understands that your guests must take priority over other social acquaintances,’ Mrs Bonneville said. She turned her sour face on Alex. ‘Isn’t that so, Mr Meade?’

‘Indeed it is, Mrs Bonneville,’ Meade agreed.

‘Then let us go, child,’ Mrs Bonneville said, almost pushing Clarissa away from the table.

Meade watched the two women depart, then sighed softly to himself.

‘There was a time when that dragon would have given her right arm to see me marry her daughter,’ he said.

‘So what changed?’ Blackstone asked.

‘I became a policeman, and her attitude towards me altered overnight.’

‘What if you left the force and joined your father’s firm? Would her attitude alter again?’

‘Oh, yes. Then I’d once more be a good catch,’ Meade said. ‘But I don’t really care what she thinks of me.’

‘No?’

‘Not at all. I love Clarissa, and, in the end, we will be married.’

‘And does she love you?’ Blackstone wondered.

‘Of course she does,’ Meade said. He grinned, a little sheepishly. ‘But perhaps she’s not yet quite as aware of it as she might be.’

‘Tell me more about Inspector O’Brien,’ Blackstone said.

‘He was a wonderful man,’ Meade said, and as he spoke, his eyes began to mist over. ‘Of all the appointments Roosevelt made during his brief tenure, Patrick’s was by far the most important. Teddy gave him a roving brief — to root out police corruption wherever he could find it — and though there were plenty of people who would have liked to have stripped him of that power once Roosevelt went, nobody’s ever had the guts to do it. It was Patrick’s mission to cleanse the department or die trying.’ The sergeant shuddered. ‘And die trying is just what he did.’

‘You know what you’re implying, don’t you?’ Blackstone said carefully. ‘You’re implying that O’Brien was killed by a fellow officer.’

‘Yes, that is what I believe,’ Meade agreed. ‘And I’m not the only one.’

‘Who else believes it?’

‘Commissioner Comstock.’

‘Are you sure of that?’

‘Of course. Why do you think he arranged for you to be part of this investigation? It’s because he knows he can trust you.’

Especially after he listened in on my conversation with James Duffy, Blackstone thought.

‘And why did he pick me, a mere sergeant, to lead it?’ Meade continued. ‘For the same reason. And why are there only two of us involved in the investigation? Because with the whole of the New York Police Department at his disposal, we’re the only two people he knows with any certainty that he can have complete faith in.’

They were surrounded on all sides by things German. There were shops displaying German goods. There were bakeries with German names, which sold German bread and pastries. There were beer gardens which offered only German beer, and where the clients were entertained by brass bands playing only German music. Even the newspaper vendors — looking very Germanic themselves — had nothing to offer but newspapers written in German.

‘What did you say that the name of this area was?’ Blackstone asked Alex Meade.

‘It’s called Kleindeutschland,’ the sergeant replied. ‘That means “Little Germany”.’

‘And why would they ever have thought of calling it that?’ Blackstone said wryly.

‘Well, because. .’ Meade began earnestly. Then he stopped himself, and smiled. ‘I suppose that would be an example of the English sense of humour, would it?’

‘Yes — or what passes for one, anyway,’ Blackstone agreed. ‘How many Germans are there in New York?’

‘There are around three hundred thousand people who are German or of German extraction.’

‘And they all live in this area?’

‘They used to — but not any more. They’ve mostly moved north to Yorktown, and now the tenements that they formerly inhabited have been taken over by a new wave of immigrants — the Eastern European Jews. But even though they no longer live here, this is where the Germans still come to do most of their shopping and have a good time.’

‘Three hundred thousand,’ Blackstone mused. ‘That’s a hell of a lot of Germans.’

‘That’s nothing compared to the number of Irish in the city,’ Meade said dismissively. ‘There’s maybe one and half million people living on Manhattan Island, and eight hundred thousand of them were either born in Ireland themselves or have parents or grandparents who were.’

‘Big number,’ Blackstone said.

‘Ain’t it, though,’ Meade agreed. He smiled again. ‘Shows just how much they must have liked being ruled over by you English.’

True, Blackstone thought, and wondered if he’d ever see a solution to the Irish problem in his lifetime.

Blackstone sensed Meade’s good humour suddenly evaporate, and looking ahead of him, he thought he understood the cause.

They were approaching a saloon which called itself the Bayern Biergarten, and on the sidewalk outside it there was a rough circle of sawdust.

‘Is that where it happened?’ Blackstone asked.

‘That’s where it happened,’ Meade confirmed mournfully. ‘It was on this very spot that a fine man died last night.’

When they reached the circle of sawdust, they came to a halt, and Meade brushed some of the sawdust away with his shoe, revealing the red stain on the sidewalk.

‘They just covered it up. They couldn’t even be bothered to wash it away,’ Meade said angrily. ‘And that’s how they want this investigation to go.’

‘What do you mean?’ Blackstone asked.

‘They think all they have to do is cover it up and wait for it to slowly fade away, so that in the end everybody will simply have forgotten about it,’ Meade said, his rage growing. ‘But I won’t forget. I can promise you that!’

‘What has the investigation been able to uncover so far?’ Blackstone asked.

‘Haven’t you even begun to understand what’s going on here yet?’ Meade demanded, with uncharacteristic rudeness. ‘There’s been no investigation. The owner of the biergarten called the police, and the police took Inspector O’Brien’s body to the morgue. And that’s it! That’s all that’s been done.’

‘You’re sure about that?’

‘I’m sure. There can’t be more than a handful of men on the force who care whether the murder’s solved or not — and there’s probably at least a handful who most definitely don’t want it solved.’