Charles Finch - Fleet Street murders

The warden was in. The man who had led Lenox up to the warden’s office went in and had a quick word and then poked his head out of the door to nod Lenox inside.

The man in charge of Newgate was fifty or so but looked strong and healthy. He was standing at a window that overlooked the courtyard, watching a group of thirty ill-looking men straggle around below him. A cup of tea was in one hand.

“How do you do, Mr. Lenox?” he asked. “I was surprised to hear you had come. I thought you were in the north.”

“How do you do, sir. Yes, I was, but have returned for a day.”

“Plus I may help you, I take it?”

“If you would be so good.”

“Inspector Exeter was here.” A small smile formed on the warden’s face. “Do you agree with his suppositions about this case, Mr. Lenox?”

“I haven’t had the honor of hearing your name, sir,” said Lenox stiffly. He disliked the warden’s savoring of the situation.

He stuck out his hand. “I’m Timothy Natt, and very pleased.”

“Pleased. I’m not sure whether I agree with Inspector Exeter, to answer your question. A friend has asked me to look over this matter, and I thought I would begin here.”

“With 122?”

“Excuse me?”

“With prisoner 122. Mr. Hiram Smalls.”

“Ah-indeed.”

“We give all of our prisoners a number when they enter Newgate.”

“I see.”

“I often hear from prisoners-I speak to them regularly, you see, in keeping with our modern trend of better inmate care-that they tire of being called only by their number. It’s 74 this, 74 that, 74 everywhere, as one man-prisoner 74-remarked to me.”

Lenox concealed a smile. Some pomposity here then. “I had hoped to see Mr. Smalls’s cell?”

“If you wish, yes.”

“Has anybody inhabited it since he left?”

“No, Mr. Lenox. Because the case attracted such attention, we have been scrupulous in our handling of 122.”

“Well-in most ways,” said Lenox wryly.

“Sir?” asked Natt rigidly.

“Only-well, he died.”

Natt drew himself up. “I can assure you that had we known he was in any danger from another prisoner, as Inspector Exeter thinks, or had we known he was a threat to himself-we would have-we would have-this is a well-run prison, sir.” With this piece of bluster complete, the warden took a violent sip of tea.

Lenox was quick to conciliate him. “Oh, of course,” he said. “I never meant to imply otherwise. A model, from what I’ve seen.”

“Well,” said Natt, with a definite “humph.”

“What about his personal effects, sir?”

“Excuse me?”

“His personal effects? The things you confiscated from him on his entrance to Newgate-pipe, purse, that sort of thing?”

Natt stared at Lenox for a moment before saying, “I’m ashamed to admit this, sir, but neither Exeter nor I thought to look at them.”

“What?”

“It’s quite possible-indeed, probable-that they have been remitted to the care of his family.”

Lenox cursed. Natt couldn’t have been expected to think of it, but Exeter! “Well, do you keep a list of what the prisoners arrive with?”

Natt brightened. “Ah! We do! Rime,” he shouted out to his assistant, “122’s list of effects! On my desk! I see that you’re a sharp one, Mr. Lenox. The papers were right. The Oxford case, I mean to say.”

Not wanting to be drawn, after a moment’s pause Lenox said, “Shall we see the cell, then?”

“Certainly, if you wish.”

To reach the cell they walked through a series of dank corridors, some lined with cells and some not. The prisoners they met along the way were alternatively listless or loud, though when they saw the warden they all went quiet. At last, when Lenox could smell fresh air for the first time since he had entered Newgate’s walls, they stopped at a cell.

“The prison yard is just down here, the place where prisoners may exercise and socialize.” The guard following them opened the door. “You see we left the cell intact.”

It was a poor little place to spend one’s final days in. A narrow cot with rumpled sheets took up most of the space, with a small, ill-made, but solid nightstand just by it. The hook Smalls had hanged himself from was just to the right of the cell’s front bars.

“The bits of paper-the oranges-they were on the nightstand?”

“Precisely. Inspector Exeter took those as evidence.”

“Did he say of what?”

“No, Mr. Lenox. Not that I can recollect. Exeter and I suspected that whoever did this, if 122 was murdered, tore up the papers to conceal their meaning.”

“No,” Lenox murmured.

“Excuse me?”

“Ah-you’ll pardon me, I didn’t know I was speaking out loud. I doubt it, though, that’s true. A murderer would either have taken the papers or left them. Smalls himself tore them up. Whether meaningfully or not remains to be seen.”

“Inspector Exeter was certainly of the opinion,” said Natt shaking his head with certainty, “that the murderer did it.”

“Would it be easy for a guard or a prisoner to murder someone here, Mr. Natt?”

“Not a guard, certainly.”

“A prisoner, then?”

“Yes, sadly. Before 122’s death we left vacant cells open while their inhabitants were in the yard. It would have been easy to sneak into a cell and lie in wait, I suppose. There’s a great deal of chaos, unfortunately, and since some cells are overcrowded a person might not be missed for-say, half an hour.”

“Then bribe a guard to return to his own cell?”

“Well-”

“I take your point, Mr. Natt. There are also deliveries and so forth to the prison?”

“Yes, sir. All prisoners with sufficient funds may order in food, books, pen and paper, etc.”

“Is the delivery person admitted to the cell?”

“Yes.”

“So again-it wouldn’t be impossible to pretend you were a delivery person and somehow gain access to a cell?”

“Not impossible.”

“Is there a list of incoming deliveries?”

“We have-er-discussed it.”

“I see. Well-may I look over this room?”

“Yes, of course you may.”

Lenox began, as was his wont, by searching from the ground up. With a lack of ceremony that plainly surprised Natt, he lay flat on his stomach and took a preliminary look under the bed. Lighting a match from a matchbox in his pocket, he then made a more comprehensive survey of the space. He took enough time for Natt to offer an impatient throat clearing, but in the end the time he took was worth it. Behind one of the bed’s feet he found a pile of coins, stacked in order of size so that they made a small pyramid. He picked it up carefully and spread the coins in his palm.

“A farthing, a halfpenny, a penny, threepence, sixpence, and a shilling. All the coins of the realm up to the shilling,” said Lenox.

“You would be surprised what people hoard in here.”

“Of course. Wouldn’t he have kept money on his person, though?”

“In fact, no. There are frequent incidents of theft and mugging, I’m afraid.”

“It’s to be expected. What could this buy?”

“A pair of trousers?”

“I know what it could buy in our world,” said Lenox, “but in here?”

“Oh-oh. Perhaps five breakfasts? Four suppers?”

“Tobacco?”

“To be sure.”

With this Lenox resumed his search, looking under the nightstand, removing its one drawer and searching for false joints, and trying to pry off its top, until he was convinced it was innocent of further contents. Then he searched the visible floor, then the walls, and after that the ledge of the tiny window.

There was very little else in the cell, and finally he turned his attention to the hook Smalls had died on. It was slightly loose, no doubt from bearing all the weight it had. Lenox couldn’t make much of it but noticed a brown square about a foot below it, the size of another hook.