Bruce Alexander: An Experiment in Treason

But Mr. Donnelly would have none of that. He stepped forward, bowl in hand, for his dip into the stew pot. “Jeremy,” said he brightly, “you should have told me you’d an Irishwoman in your midst. Had you done, I should have been here in a trice to welcome her to London.”

I stammered out an excuse which was no excuse at all: “I … I … never knew that she was Irish.” And having said that, I was reminded that Sir John did hazard when first we met her that she seemed Irish.

“But how could you think otherwise?” said he. “Hair the color of fire … eyes of cornflower blue … freckles … Why, she’s the picture of Irish womanhood.”

“Mr. Donnelly, please, you’re makin’ me blush,” said Molly — and indeed she was blushing.

She giggled. I had never before, in the three months of our acquaintanceship, heard her giggle. Nor, for that matter, had I ever seen or heard Mr. Donnelly play the gallant. I was greatly puzzled by their actions. They seemed, ordinarily and separately, to be such sensible people. I carried my bowl of stew back to the table and settled in next to Clarissa. For her part, she seemed quite fascinated — and secretly amused — by their odd behavior. In response to my frown, she gave me a wry smile and a wink.

“Now, I believe,” cried Mr. Donnelly’ from the other end of the table, “that is the best mutton stew that I have ever in my life tasted!”

“Ah, now, please do stop,” said Molly to him, blushing still.

There was, it seemed, little could be done to halt him. Yet in a last effort to divert attention from herself, she cried out, “Clarissa!”

“What then, Molly?”

“You must show these two we have our adventures, as well. Tell them how you spent last night, child.”

Now was it Clarissa’s time to wriggle uncomfortably in her chair. She seemed not so much embarrassed as discomforted. This was clearly something she would prefer not to go into just at that moment.

“Oh, let it go,” said Clarissa. “They’ll hear about it soon enough — Jeremy will, anyway.”

“Do please tell, Clarissa,” urged Mr. Donnelly, then added, “I hope you were put in no danger.”

“Oh no, nothing like that.” She threw an uneasy glance at me. “It’s the sort of thing that Jeremy attends to every week — or every day, for all I know.”

“Well now,” said I, “you must tell us.” Though just at that moment I had no idea of what her “adventure” might have been, I would soon find out, for she seemed to take what I had just said as permission to proceed, and she did then begin to tell her tale.

I take the liberty here of retelling it in my own words, rather than attempt a verbatim account, for on this occasion, as on so many others in those days, she missed no opportunity to digress, diverting her own attention, as well as that of her listeners, to unimportant details and parenthetical events.

But now to her story: Clarissa was wakened in the middle of the night by Lady Fielding, who told her that she was needed by Sir John to accompany him to the residence of Lord Hillsborough where a burglary had taken place. Dressing hurriedly, Clarissa was ready to depart with him, and following the manner he suggested, she led the way down the stairs and out into the street with his hand placed upon her shoulder. Outside, in Bow Street, a hackney coach awaited them. Benjamin Bailey, the first of the Bow Street Runners, stood by and threw open the door to the hackney. He whisked them inside and jumped in after them.

As the coach moved them on toward their destination. Sir John did carefully explain to her the part she would play in the action that lay ahead. (Here I quote him, as she conveyed his words to us there at the table.) “Clarissa,” said he, “as you know, I am blind. I manage to do the work of one with sight only with help, which is customarily provided by Jeremy. In his absence, I shall depend upon you to provide that help. In short, I ask you to serve as my eyes. When we arrive, I shall require you to describe to me all that you see at the scene of the crime. I shall prompt you and ask you questions. I shall ask you to be by my side when I interrogate any and all who may have information to give. I am capable of sniffing out all but the visible signs of lying. The smell of fear, the unsteady voice, the sound of the throat that must consistently be cleared, shortness of breath — all of these I can readily detect. But I shall depend upon you to tell me if there is overmuch sweating, or if there is an unconscious refusal to focus direct upon me whilst I ask the questions. Is all of that clear, Clarissa?”

Indeed it was. She must have done a remarkably good job of describing the place to Sir John, for she did a proper job of describing it to us — until she lost her way in a digression which took us to Bloomsbury Square for purposes of comparing its imposing facades with that of Lord Hillsborough’s grand house in — or just outside — Whitehall.

(Clarissa said that she believed Lord Hillsborough’s residence to be one of those by Inigo Jones. Molly wished to know who then was Inigo Jones and why he had such an odd name. It took me a bit of pleading to get matters back on track.)

The reason why she did concern herself with such matters was that the burglars had actually managed to enter by way of the front door. One of them (there were apparently only two in all) had been most adept with a picklock. As the night watchman made his rounds, timed roughly at five-minute intervals, the burglar worked upon the lock. It could not have taken long to gain entry, for there was no evidence of them having taken cover behind the shrubbery in the front of the house. Probably they were inside the house within five minutes — and probably a good deal less than that. Sir John had commented that such a bold entry by the front door was quite unusual. Oddly, none of the house dogs had barked.

Once inside, they did not have to roam about, looking for the right room. One of the two, no telling which, had acquired a bit of mud on the bottoms of his shoes, and it was possible for Clarissa to follow his track from the front door to their goal, Lord Hillsborough’s study. It seemed certain that the burglars either knew the house well, or else had a detailed diagram of it.

It immediately became clear that while the burglars knew their way through the house, they had no notion of where to look for what they sought — nor perhaps did they even know exactly what they sought. Papers littered the floor; files were emptied; drawers were thrown about. All this could not have been done silently. Noise enough was made by them to bring one of the servants, a footman, from his station in the house. Though called a footman, he seemed also to have the responsibilities of a guard within the house, for he was well-armed. He was found upon the floor of the study with a pistol in his hand and another tucked into his belt. The back of his head was crushed. Sir John commented that he must have died instantly. He added that this, too, was highly unusual for burglars: They much prefer to enter and leave, their presence undetected and, if at all possible, their theft unnoticed. These were men in a hurry, so reckless in their haste that they were forced to kill in order to continue their search. And yet Sir John declared that he thought them experienced in their trade. “If nothing more,” said he, “their entry through the front door proved that they were daring and resourceful — but desperate.”

What could have been worth so much that they would dare to be so incautious? It was to the answer of that question that he had sought out Lord Hillsborough. But the nobleman was of no help at all. He appeared before Sir John in the study, wearing a dressing gown of lustrous black silk and an icy look of contempt. That expression turned to disgust as he stood in the middle of the room and surveyed the chaos upon the floor round his desk. Though he had been forced to step over the body of the footman in order to gain the center of the room, he gave the poor fellow little attention and no sympathy: What was left of him was now simply in the way.