Murder As A Fine Art Part 37

He never learned how her path crossed that of a retired army sergeant, Samuel Brookline, or how the three of them came to live in a somewhat better shack near the docks. The former soldier, a veteran of the Battle of Waterloo, worked for a dustman, collecting coal ashes in a donkey cart, taking them to a warehouse near the docks. After the ashes were sifted in case they contained saleable objects that had mistakenly been discarded, they were sold to factories that made fertilizer or bricks.

Eventually the former soldier found a job for him with the dustman, and soon everyone thought of him as Brookline's son, just as his mother referred to herself as Mrs. Brookline even though they weren't married. But she always seemed sorrowful, and she continued weeping in the middle of the night.

One day he learned why. He and his mother were walking near the docks when a woman asked, "Margaret, good heavens, is that you?"

His mother kept walking, urging him along.

"Margaret? It is you. Margaret Jewell."

While his mother's first name was Margaret, she had always told him that her last name was Brody before she met the former soldier and took his name.

The woman caught up to his mother and asked, "What's wrong? Margaret, don't you recognize me? I'm Nancy. I used to work in the shop three doors down from Marr."

"Maybe I look like someone else," his mother said brusquely. "I don't know who Marr was. I'm sure I never saw you before."

"The Ratcliffe Highway murders. I would've sworn. You're really not Margaret? Sorry. I must've made a mistake. Really, I would've sworn."

The woman left them. The boy and his mother continued along the street.

"The Ratcliffe Highway murders?" the boy asked.

"Nothing to concern you," his mother told him.

But there was something in her eyes, a haunted look that made him resolve to learn what the Ratcliffe Highway murders were and who Margaret Jewell was.

One evening, he took a detour when he returned from the dustman's warehouse. He went to Ratcliffe Highway, asked about the murders, and was shocked to learn the details. Although they were eleven years in the past, their terror remained vivid to those who had lived in the neighborhood.

"Mother," he asked one evening when he found her alone in the shack, weeping, "did that woman the other day truly recognize you? Are you Margaret Jewell?"

His mother looked frightened then, as if he had accused her instead of asked her.

"Did you work for the Marr family that was murdered?"

Her look of fright changed to one of horror.

"Did you know John Williams? People say that they knew him in the neighborhood and that he sometimes came into the shop."

His mother screamed.

The former soldier rushed into the shack but couldn't calm her.

"What happened?"

"I just asked her about the Ratcliffe Highway murders," the boy said.

"Why would you ask about them?"

"Someone mentioned them. I was curious."

"I worked on the docks back then," the former soldier told him. "You can't imagine how terrified everybody felt. Twelve days later, they happened again."

His mother put her hands to her face.

"What's troubling you, Margaret?" the former soldier asked. "Did you know someone who was killed in those murders?"

A few days later, the boy made another detour after working at the dustman's warehouse. He returned to Ratcliffe Highway, asked more questions, and was directed to the King's Arms tavern, where the second murders had occurred.

A printed copy of a sketch was displayed inside one of the tavern's windows for people going past to read. The sketch showed a man in left profile, with curly hair, a high forehead, a sharp nose, and a strong chin. A name was under the sketch, but the boy had not learned to read.

An announcement was next to the sketch, but the boy couldn't read that, either.

"Sir," he asked a man walking past, "would you please tell me what this says?"

The man had ordinary clothes and was not of sufficient standing to be called "sir," but the boy had learned that pretending to be polite could produce rewards, such as a piece of bread, when he visited households to gather coal ashes. The boy also paid the man a compliment by a.s.suming he could read.

"Of course, boy. The words under this sketch give the name John Williams. A vicious sort he was, as the words on this other piece of paper tell us."

The man drew a finger along the window and the poster beyond it. " 'On this site, 19 December 1811, the infamous murderer John Williams slaughtered tavernkeeper John Williamson, his wife, and a servant girl.' Poor form, using the murders to attract customers to the tavern."

The boy stared at the sketch of John Williams. A lamppost was behind him. People moving along the street caused the shadows to change and made him aware of reflections on the window. In particular, he became aware of his reflection, of his face next to that of John Williams: high forehead, sharp nose, and strong chin.

"Better not stare at him too long," the man advised. "With that curly hair of yours, you look a little like him. You don't want to give yourself nightmares."

"No, sir."

"Can't read, huh? Would you like to learn?"

The boy thought a moment and realized that, if he didn't know how to read, he wouldn't be able to learn more about John Williams and the Ratcliffe Highway murders.

"No, sir, I can't read. Yes, sir, I'd like to learn."

"Good lad. Do you know where St. Nicholas church is? It's down by the docks. St. Nicholas is the patron saint of sailors and merchants."

"The church is near the warehouse where I work for dustman Kendrick."

"A dustman, are you? Want to make something better of yourself?"

"Yes, sir."

"On Sunday morning, come to the nine o'clock service. I help the minister. After the service, I teach people how to read the Bible. I know that's your day of rest from being a dustman, but I always give a cookie to any children who come to learn to read the holy word."

The boy's stomach rumbled at the thought of the cookie. "Thank you, sir."

"With those good manners, you'll go far, boy. Now do what I say and stop looking at that sketch before it gives you nightmares."

To the puzzlement of his mother and the former soldier, the boy went to church every Sunday, sat through the service, attended his reading lesson, and received a cookie. He became the best student the church had ever seen. Within a year, he could read any Bible pa.s.sage his teacher presented to him.

He went to every newspaper and learned that they had archives in which reports about John Williams and the Ratcliffe Highway murders were stored. He read all of them until he knew them by memory.

He found a copy of a sketch of Williams and carried it in a pocket, studying it when no one saw him.

"Mother, who was my father?" the boy asked.

"He died a long time ago."

"But who was he? Tell me about him."

"It hurts me to think about him."

"How did he die? Is that why you sob at night?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"What was his name?"

His mother turned away.

After work, the boy kept returning to Ratcliffe Highway. He frequently entered the building where Marr had been killed. It was still a linen shop, its layout exactly as described in the newspaper accounts. The boy imagined where the bodies had lain, where the blood had sprayed.

He returned to the King's Arms tavern, this time going inside, again imagining where the bodies and the gore had been.

He pretended that he walked next to the cart that had transported his father's body past twenty thousand people to the crossroads of Cannon and Cable streets, where his father had been buried with a stake through his heart. The boy positioned himself in the middle of the crossroads. As traffic rattled past and drivers shouted for him to get out of the way, he wondered if he stood on top of his father's bones.

He was under a dock when the former soldier discovered him.

"Stop!"

The boy spun. He had muzzled a cat so that it couldn't wail. Its legs were tied.

"Why would you do that?" the former soldier demanded.

The man grabbed the knife from the boy's hand, freed the cat's muzzle, and released the cords around the cat's legs. Despite its injuries, the cat managed to run away.

One night, the boy showed the sketch of John Williams to his mother.

"Is this my father?"

She recoiled from the image.

"John Williams. He's my father, right?"

She stared at him in horror.

"Why did my father kill all those people?"

She wailed.

The former soldier hurried in, shouting at the boy, "What in blazes did you do now?"

"I asked her if John Williams was my father."

Weeping, his mother sank to her knees.

The former soldier shoved the boy toward the door. "Leave her alone! Get out! I don't want to see you here anymore!"

"You're not my father! You can't give me orders!"

With a gasp, the man staggered back. His breath driven from him, he peered down at the knife the boy had plunged into his stomach.

"Tell me, Mother. Am I John Williams's son?"

"You're a monster the same as your father was."

The boy plunged the knife into her also, hurled the shack's lantern onto the floor, and stepped outside.

Behind him, amid screams, flames crackled.

AS BROOKLINE STUDIED THE WAX display of his father swinging the mallet, footsteps brought his attention back to the present.

He turned toward three men who appeared at the doorway. Two of them came into the room while the other remained at the entrance, making sure that no one eavesdropped from the corridor.

Brookline stepped toward them, positioning himself in front of another exhibit, one that showed the body s.n.a.t.c.hers, Burke and Hare, frozen in the midst of removing a corpse from a coffin they had excavated. A plaque explained that Burke and Hare sold corpses to surgeons who had few legal ways to obtain bodies for medical research. To provide even better specimens, Burke and Hare took to murdering people.

By conducting the conversation before this exhibit, Brookline distracted his a.s.sociates from noticing the resemblance between him and John Williams in the later tableau.

"Anthony was killed at the prison last night," Brookline told them.

The three men adjusted to this information.

"The newspapers reported that someone was killed there in addition to the governor," the man at the door finally said. "Not the Opium-Eater. Someone else. I hoped it wasn't Anthony."

"He was very convincing as a would-be a.s.sa.s.sin outside Lord Palmerston's mansion," Brookline told them. "The fireworks he set off during his escape through Green Park were memorable."

"G.o.dspeed to him," the two men said.

"G.o.dspeed," Brookline echoed solemnly. "He was a man worthy to share combat with. Tonight we pay tribute to him."

HERE," MARGARET SAID.

"Stop," Ryan told their driver.

The coach halted outside a bakeshop on a gloomy street near the Seven Dials rookery. While most of the area near the slum was unusually empty, the shop bustled with activity.

"What's going on?" Becker asked with a frown.

He and Emily helped Margaret down and escorted her inside. Frantic people jostled past them, hurrying out, carrying bread.

"Figured you quit," the owner grumbled behind the counter.