niece. Is he going to do something, or just shake his head and go on to the next thing?”
“That’s not his way. If you’d seen him when I brought him word, then you’d know that.”
“Did he shed a tear? I wept for that child all night long.”
“No, that’s not his way, either. He can’t cry. It’s to do with his blindness.”
“All right, put it like this: Has he got anybody working on it?”
I hesitated but a moment. “I’m working on it right now.”
He sniggered in spite of himself. “You? What’re you doing here? Investigating the horses?”
“No, Sir John sent me here because he believed you were capable of killing your sister when you left him yester evening. He thought it would be good if I showed up here, so you’d see me and know that we were keeping an eye on you.”
“I b’lieve I could have done her in if I’d come across her
“But not now?”
“No, not now. Whilst I was busy shedding tears, I did some thinking. And it seemed to me that he-and prob’ly you, too-are better at investigating than I’ll ever be. So the best thing would be if we was to investigate together. You help me, and I’ll help you.”
“After all,” said I, “whatever you think of your sister, it wasn’t she who killed her daughter. We’ll need her to find the one who did.”
“That’s where I come in,” said he. “I’ve got some ideas where she might be. And I thought we might go together, that is, if you. .”
“I’ll need all the help you can give me, Mr. Deuteronomy.”
“All right then, what say we get us together and meet at the coffee house that faces onto Haymarket Square-say about eleven o’clock.”
“I know the place. I’ll be there at eleven.”
With that, he nodded, turned, and walked away. Well, I thought, there’ll be a lot to talk about with Sir John when I get back to Bow Street.
On the contrary, my report to Sir John was given to him quickly in his study. He listened carefully to all that I had to say, nodding thoughtfully but making no comment. Even when I came at last to the offer made by Deuteronomy Plummer to join in the search for his sister, Sir John’s immediate response was simply a grunt. ’Twas only as I completed my recital and rose to return to the kitchen that the magistrate commented upon the information I had given him.
“I take it you accepted Deuteronomy’s offer of help?”
“Why, yes I did,” said I. “Is that not as you would have it?”
“Oh yes, certainly it is. But let me give you a bit of advice.”
“Please, sir.”
“Simply put, it is this: Though he may have said that you know more than he about how to conduct an investigation, he will nevertheless try to wrest control of the investigation from you. Don’t allow him to do that. Remember that you have something specific that you had intended to attend to. One way or another, with him or without him, you must attend to it. You will, won’t you?”
“I will, sir,” said I, yet still I hung on, unwilling to leave.
“You may go, Jeremy. Your dinner may be cold, yet I think you will deem it one of the best you’ve eaten.”
“I’m indeed looking forward to it, sir, but. . well, may I ask, is there perhaps something wrong?”
“Wrong? How do you mean that, Jeremy?”
“You seemed so silent, so removed.”
“Oh, I heard you well enough, but my mind was, I admit, upon other matters. It being Easter, I found myself thinking upon this Plummer case-the little girl pulled dead from the Thames, perhaps sold by her mother to a fate so hideous it cannot, should not, even be mentioned. I wondered what, if anything, God thinks of all this-if He may wonder from time to time if it was all worth the trouble.” He sighed a deep-oh, a profound sigh. And only then did he add, “I received Mr. Donnelly’s final autopsy report today. Mr. Marsden read it to me. It seems then that in spite of all that was done to her, Margaret Plummer died of asphyxiation. She was smothered.”
With that, I bade him goodnight and went down to claim my dinner. A considerable slice of that glorious ham, of which Clarissa was so proud, had been warmed for me upon the fire in a pan. The potatoes and carrots, more difficult to warm, were served to me cold by her.
Ah, but Clarissa was afterward anything but cold. We did hug and kiss, squeeze and fondle, for now that we were engaged to be engaged, she allowed me liberties (indeed, took a few herself) which were never before offered, nor even requested. Such was our situation: we carried on a courtship under the very noses of Sir John and Lady Fielding, altogether certain that they guessed naught of the change in our relations. But perhaps they knew more, and knew it earlier, than we had supposed.
Next day, when I met with Deuteronomy Plummer at the Haymarket Coffee House, I spread out before him on the table all the numbered stubs and tickets that I had found in Katy Tiddle’s room.
He glanced at them indifferently, shrugged, and said, “What about them?”
“Well, what are they? I’ve studied them, and all I can tell you is that the numbers were written by diverse hands, and that, no matter how they are arranged and rearranged, they make no sense. That is to say, there was no code discernible. But how could there be, with so many numbers in so many different hands? After all-?”
“Leave off, leave off,” said Mr. Deuteronomy in a way somewhat gruff. “You mean to tell me that you’ve no proper notion of what these here bits of paper might be?”
“None at all.” I hesitated. “It’s been suggested to me that these may be pawn tickets, though somehow I doubt it.”
“Well, that tells me more about you than it does about this Katy Tiddle woman. Of course they’re pawn tickets. Did you never pawn?”
I was annoyed at the lordly manner he had, of a sudden, taken on. “What does that tell you about me?” I demanded.
“It tells me you was brought up as a child of privilege, for one thing,” said he.
“If it tells you that, it tells you false, for I am an orphan and nothing more. I work as I do for Sir John to pay my keep. I am the servant, and he my master.”
That, reader, was by no means a fair summary of where I stood with regard to Sir John, nor he with me. If you have read thus far, then you know that he was to me far more in the nature of a teacher. And the things he taught did often exceed lessons in the law. It would not have been too much to claim him as my stepfather, yet I would not do so to Deuteronomy Plummer, for his remark had irritated me beyond telling. Child of privilege, indeed! I had all manner of household duties to perform. I served as Sir John’s amanuensis, writing the letters he dictated to me and often delivering them, as well. I served as the magistrate’s eyes during investigations of every sort, and, upon occasion, also as his bodyguard. And, finally, I had lately played substitute for Mr. Marsden, Sir John’s court clerk, during his recent bouts with influenza. And so on.
Yet I told Mr. Deuteronomy none of this, for he gave me little opportunity to speak out, blurting forth so swiftly that I doubt he heard my voiced reply at all.
“And what it tells me of Katy Tiddle is that she is a woman made poor by her drinking, as is my sister. I’ve met the woman upon occasion, she livin’ next door to my sister, and that is the opinion of her I have formed. Those numbered stubs and tickets-call them what you will-is from pawn shops hereabouts. It took two days time, and you still hadn’t figured out what they were, nor where they was from. Anybody don’t know what pawn tickets look like is a proper child of privilege, as far as I’m concerned. And anyways, why should we be chasing after what this woman pawned? Why ain’t we out chasing after Alice herself?”
“Just how much did Sir John tell you about Katy Tiddle and how she fits into this case?”
“Well, I. .” He hesitated, unable for a moment to express himself. Then did he begin again: “Truth of it is, after I heard about little Maggie, how she died and all, I didn’t get much after that. I remember he said something about Tiddle, but I’m afraid I didn’t take in what it was.”
“I can understand that. But listen, we’ve good reason to think that Katy Tiddle brought the man who took Maggie away to your sister. She served as a sort of go-between. It seemed to me that he came back and killed
