Stephen Gallagher - The Bedlam Detective

The boy soldiers were watching him with dead eyes. Their manner had changed. They were no longer passive but had been given the upper hand.

One said, “What do we do with him?”

And the other, the one that he’d berated, shrugged and then blew air out through closed lips in a gesture that said, Don’t ask me .

Sebastian said, “If there’s a police station, you take me there.”

“You shut yer mouth,” the second one said.

So Sebastian settled back for the rest of the grim ride, and closed his eyes and looked inward, where he saw again the uncompleted moment as the county detective reached to uncover a dead child’s face.

Molly or Florence. He didn’t know which.

Perhaps he should have stayed in his room. For he’d surely achieved nothing for anyone by leaving it.

The motor truck stopped right by the Sun inn’s coachyard gate. In the absence of the parish constable, who was now out on a bicycle making house-to-house visits to all of Arnmouth’s holiday villas, Sebastian was placed in the charge of the cook.

“What am I supposed to do with you?” she said.

“Strictly speaking,” Sebastian said, “you ought to lock me up. Tempers were frayed up there and I’m supposed to be under arrest. Don’t fear, ma’am. It was a misunderstanding in the moment. And I’m not the most pressing thing for the authorities to deal with right now.”

“Have they found the girls?”

“I don’t think that’s for me to say.”

“It’s something bad, isn’t it?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“Did they drown?”

“It’s worse than that.”

She knew. Her hand flew to her mouth, and for a moment she looked drained and ill.

Sebastian said, “I’m sorry. I gather it’s not the first time that children have come to grief?”

But she left him then, too upset to say.

AFTER ANOTHER fifteen minutes or so, a rocket was sent up from the harbor. It burst high above the town and came down in a shower of light, like an angel winged by grapeshot. It was the signal for all of the search parties to abandon their efforts, for whatever reason. It was to be a good two hours until Stephen Reed returned. In that time, Sebastian obeyed the letter of his arrest and did not leave the inn. He did, however, go up to his room.

He could not settle, nor even think of returning to his reading. Sir Owain’s book would have to wait. He went through to the upstairs dining room and watched through various windows as the Specials gathered on the street and climbed into cars and wagons to be transported up to the site.

Only the Sun Inn’s landlord wore the police uniform. The others wore volunteer armbands and apprehensive looks. Missing children were one thing, murdered children another. Those who’d willingly joined a search party now found themselves being shepherded up the hill to less welcome duties.

There was a telephone close by. It was across the way in the house of the preventative officer, the town’s own customs official, and was in constant use with people running back and forth with messages.

After about an hour, activity began to center on a large building three doors down, separated from the customs house by a row of alms cottages. This building was tall and churchlike, with high windows and a bricked-up Gothic doorway. The entrance in use was to the side of it, and much less striking.

Gaslights were lit inside, and all the doors were thrown open. After a while a cart arrived, bearing a number of well-used trestle tables. By now a crowd had gathered, and some lent a hand to carry them. Blackout curtains were raised at the windows to create a private space within.

Throughout all this time, the light was fading; and at the point where the day was all but extinguished in the sky, a number of the Specials returned and moved everybody back. They set up a ring around the building, where they stood facing outward and looking uncomfortable at this implied confrontation with their neighbors. But the small crowd complied, as if they, too, had a role to play here, and wished only to be told what was proper.

Where were the parents, Sebastian wondered? Not here and waiting on the pavement for news, that was for sure. But no one would ever envy them this day. In fact, Florence Bell’s mother was in their rented villa, and her father on his way up from London. The parents of Molly Button-childhood friend, now fixed in her childhood forever-would know nothing about anything until the next morning, when a telegram would reach them at their hotel in Aix-les-Bains.

And now the light was gone. It was not so much like the fading of the day as the looming of a terrible shadow, rising from the woodland on the far side of the hill and inking out the sky.

The wagons came then, down from the hill in a silent convoy. The one bearing the stretchers led, and the ring of volunteers opened to let it pass through. The bodies were taken into the hall and one of the Specials gave a hand to help the vicar, who’d made the journey with them, to climb down and follow after. He was elderly, and the climb was difficult for him. The girls were fully sheeted, but their small forms were unmistakable. Some of the women turned away. The men stared, bleakly.

Boxes and bags were taken in, all the evidence collected from the scene. The local doctor arrived from the hill a few minutes later and followed the bodies into the hall.

There was little to see after that. The doors were closed, the volunteers dispersed, the wagons all sent away. There was a general move toward the church. One man remained to guard the door of the hall.

After a while, the church bell began to ring.

Stephen Reed entered the Sun inn’s ill-lit and deserted snug about half an hour later.

He’d left papers and his briefcase on the map table. No one had been in to light the gas, and the only illumination came from the passageway behind the bar.

He started to gather his few effects together, and then he seemed to lose heart. He kicked out the chair and sat, heavily.

Sebastian said, startling the officer a little, “Is this your first murder?”

Reed recovered himself. “No,” he said.

“But your first with children.”

He peered at Sebastian in the gloom. Sebastian moved forward, the better to be seen.

“Sebastian Becker. I’m the special investigator for the Lord Chancellor’s Visitor in Lunacy.”

“Oh?”

“You had me arrested for trying to protect your evidence. What happened to the camera I was holding? Please tell me you didn’t let those boys interfere with it.”

“That was a camera?” the detective said.

“I believe so.”

“It was like none I’ve ever seen.”

“Where is it now?”

“Over in the assembly rooms, along with the bodies. Everything’s there.”

“It’s a slim chance,” Sebastian suggested, “but the plate may carry an image from those girls’ last hour. Has anyone been stupid enough to open it?”

Stephen Reed’s distraction fell away, and his sense of purpose seemed to return.

“Oh, Lord,” he said. “I hope not.”

He went out onto the street. A reasonably bright-looking child in a cadet’s uniform was passing, and Stephen Reed collared him. He sent him at a run with a message for the man on the door at the hall. Then he came back inside.

“You’re not a policeman?” Stephen Reed said.

“I used to be.”

“But you work for the Lord Chancellor now.”

“For his Visitor in Lunacy. Sir James Crichton-Browne.”

“What does that mean?”

Sebastian took out the letters of authority that he always carried with him.

“When the sanity of a man of property is questioned,” he said, handing the letters over, “it’s the Visitor’s duty to determine whether such a man is competent to manage his own affairs. Sometimes the mad can be devious in concealing their madness. I investigate those cases.”