The Fleet Street Murders

Pierce was, unusually, a Roman Catholic. Even on Christmas he would probably have preferred the office to his home, but he had instead endured a long supper with his wife, who was full of her father’s stories. After she had gone to bed he had come into his study restless. He took no wine and felt clearheaded.

Just as he turned to the first page of the Book of Matthew, Simon heard a soft knock at the front door of the house. The servants were asleep, and with a weary sigh he rose to his feet and made his way along the corridor between his office and the door. It was a sign of disrespect, he felt, that there was no scurry of foot audible below stairs. It didn’t occur to him to wonder why the visitor had knocked, which was sure to raise the notice only of someone nearby, rather than rung the bell, which would have sounded directly in the servants’ quarters. Simon Pierce rarely felt entirely comfortable anywhere other than the office or church, and it was with anxiety that he approached the front hall.

He opened the door.

“Yes?” he said. Before him stood a squat, strong man. “You’ll find no alms here. Seek work.”

The swish of falling rain muffled their words.

“Don’t need any,” said a distinctly unaristocratic voice. “Have some.”

“How may I help you, then?”

“Mr. Simon Pierce?”

“Yes,” said Pierce with mounting worry. “Who on earth are you?”

The man turned and looked up and down the street. One house was lit, its windows glimmering orange, but it was a hundred yards off. He took a gun from his belt and, just as Pierce stumbled backward in panic, rushed forward and shot him in the heart. The rain and a well-placed handkerchief stifled the sound of the bullet to some degree. Still, it was louder than he had expected. The squat man staggered down the steps and turned down an alley while Pierce was still on his knees, struggling vainly against death.

Half an hour later the murderer was in a different alley, in an altogether more refined part of town. He met a tall, blond, hearty-looking man, with an upper-class accent.

“It’s done, then?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Here. Your payment. In addition to the debt — that’s gone, as I promised,” he said, “but only as long as you keep quiet. Do you understand?”

He thrust a purse jangling with coins into the squat man’s hand and turned to leave without a word.

“And a merry bleedin’ Christmas,” the shooter muttered, counting the money. His hands were still shaking.

Simon Pierce was the first man he had ever killed.

CHAPTER ONE

Lenox woke up with a morning head, and as soon as he could bear to open his eyes, he gulped half the cup of coffee that his valet, butler, and trusted friend, Graham, had produced at Lenox’s first stirring.

“What are Edmund and Molly doing?” he asked Graham.

“Lady Lenox and her sons have gone to the park, sir. It’s a fine morning.”

“Depends what you mean by fine,” said Lenox. He looked at his window and winced from the sun. “It seems awfully bright. My brother’s in as much pain as I am, I hope?”

“I fear so, sir.”

“Well, there is justice in the world, then,” Lenox reflected.

“Would you like me to close your curtains, sir?”

“Thanks, yes. And can you bring me some food, for the love of all that’s good?”

“It should arrive momentarily, sir. Mary will be bringing it.”

“Cheers, Graham. Happy Boxing Day.”

“Thank you, sir. Happy Boxing Day, Mr. Lenox.”

“The staff got their presents?”

“Yes, sir. They were most gratified. Ellie in particular expressed her thanks for the set of —”

“Well, there’s a present for you in the wardrobe if you care to fetch it,” said Lenox.

“Sir?”

“I would do it myself, but I doubt I could lift a fork in my present state.”

Graham went to the wardrobe and found the broad, thin parcel, wrapped in plain brown paper and tied with brown rope.

“Thank you, sir,” he said.

“By all means.”

Graham carefully untied the rope and set about unwrapping the paper.

“Oh, just tear it,” said Lenox irritably.

Nevertheless, Graham stubbornly and methodically continued at the same pace. At last he uncovered the present. It was a broad charcoal drawing of Moscow, which he and Lenox had once visited. Both of them looked back on it as the adventure of their lives.

“I hardly know how to thank you,” said Graham, tilting it toward the light. He was a man with sandy hair and an earnest, honest mien, but now a rare smile dawned on his face.

“I had it commissioned — from one of those sketches you drew us, you know.”

“But far surpassing it in size and skill, sir.”

“Well — size anyway.”

“Thank you, sir,” said Graham.

“Well, go on, find out about breakfast, won’t you? If I waste away and die you’ll be out of a job,” said Lenox. “The papers, too.”

“Of course, sir.”

“And Merry Christmas.”

“Merry Christmas, Mr. Lenox.”

Soon breakfast came, and with it a stack of several newspapers. These Lenox ignored until he had eaten a few bites of egg and bacon and finished a second cup of coffee. Feeling more human, he glanced at the Times and then, seeing its subdued but intriguing headline, flipped through the rest of the stack. The more populist papers positively screamed the news. Two of the giants of Fleet Street were dead, their last breaths exhaled within minutes of each other, according to household members and confirmed by doctors. Both the victims of murder.

Lenox picked up one of the papers at random. It happened to be the cheapest of the weekly Sunday papers, the threepenny News of the Day, a purveyor of shocking crime news and scurrilous society rumor, which had come into existence a few decades before and instantly vaulted to popularity among the London multitudes. Most men of Lenox’s class would have considered it a degradation to even touch the cheap newsprint the News came on, but it was the detective’s bread and butter. He had often found stories in the News of the Day that no other paper printed, about domestic skirmishes in Cheapside, anonymous dark-skinned corpses down among the docks, strange maladies that spread through the slums. The paper had recently played a crucial role in reporting the case of James Barry. A famous surgeon who had performed the first successful cesarean section in all of Africa, he had died — and after his death was discovered to have in fact been, of all things, a woman. Margaret Ann, by birth. It had been for a time the story on every pair of lips in London and was still often spoken of.

SHOCK CHRISTMAS MURDER OF FLEET STREET DUO, the headline on the front page shouted. Eagerly, Lenox read the article.

The SHOCK MURDER of two of London journalism’s finest practitioners has shocked London this morning. “Winsome” Winston Carruthers, London editor of the Daily Telegraph, and the catholic Simon Pierce of the Daily News died within minutes of each other on christmas night. An