'The fact that you offer them so readily shows how little you have.'
'I could drag you down to the station and sweat it out of you,' Poole warned.
'You could try,' Barker said.
This went on most of the journey. The two men were obviously friends but rivals when it came to work. Poole backed off several times and came in on a new tack each time, trying to pry information from Barker, but my employer was as impregnable as a clam. He wouldn't even give him information we knew to be useless.
'What about you, young man?' Poole said, turning to me. 'We know about your little stretch in Oxford Prison. We may need to question you about recent events, perhaps have you spend the night in 'A' Division at Her Majesty's expense.'
It was a good threat, but I was not about to be intimidated. 'You know where to find me, sir.'
'That I do!' Poole chuckled. 'I could throw a sandwich from my window in Scotland Yard, and it would land on your office roof!'
The inspector alternately wheedled for information and crowed over his small triumphs. Barker balked like a stubborn bull, and I leaned against the cold window and thought of the poor thing that had until recently been called Miriam Smith. To think that days ago, the woman had been pretty enough to have a young scholar in love with her, a man who could have his pick of young women in the City. I pictured her brutal husband murdering her with some blunt instrument, destroying the skull of the woman he had promised to shelter and protect all his days. Who was this fellow? I had seen two bodies now, dead as a result of this man's hand. Obviously, the wretch thought himself justified in murdering for their betrayal.
When we reached Orient Street, Poole was out of the cab before the vehicle even stopped. Perhaps he hoped to catch the killer at home. The street was respectable, if a little down-at-heel. Number 327A proved to be a residence turned into flats. Our knocking at Smith's door brought many of the residents out into the hall.
'Has anyone seen Miriam Smith recently?' Poole demanded with authority.
'She gone to see her muvver days ago, now,' a stout woman spoke up.
'You saw her leave?' Poole asked.
'No. Her old man told me Tuesday. What you want wiv her?'
'Mrs. Smith was found this morning, dead at Aldgate Station!' Poole said. He seemed to enjoy causing a sensation. 'What is Mr. Smith's first name?'
'John!' the chorus called out.
'Not a very original alias,' Barker growled in my ear. 'You'll find in the East End that people change names as often as we change suits. It is possible that Mrs. Smith was not even his legal wife at all. We are on the fringe of Anglo-Jewish society here, where Jewish-Gentile couples live, and the few fallen Jewish women ply their trade.'
'When did any of you last see John Smith?'
There was a buzz of conversation, and an old fellow obviously in failing health spoke up. 'Three days ago, near abouts.'
'What was Mr. Smith's occupation?' Poole demanded.
Another murmur arose, accompanied by the shrugging of many shoulders. No words were forthcoming.
'Well?'
'Dunno, sir,' the old man answered. '†'E told me 'e were in the sugar-making trade like, sir, but Jasper 'ere says Smith claimed to be an 'ostler. Reckon 'e changed jobs reg'lar, as people do, 'ereabouts.'
'What were the Smiths like?' Barker asked.
'Kept to themselves,' the plump woman said. 'Bit high and mighty, if you ask me. I fink they was Jews, or at least she was. Been havin' rows lately. Shoutin' several times at night. Reckoned she'd packed up and gone home to mum. Looks like he done her in, he has.'
'Does anyone else live in this flat along with the Smiths?' Poole continued.
'No, sir.'
'And they haven't been here in three days?'
They all agreed neither had been there.
'Then I declare this flat abandoned. Is the landlord here?'
'Not 'im,' the old man cackled. '†'E's absentee, every day but rent day.'
'Very well!' Poole called. Turning, he raised his foot and brought it forward against the lock with great force. Barker had trained him well. Part of the door frame splintered, and the door swung open with a crash against the wall. The inspector stepped inside, we followed, and the residents of number 327A Orient crowded around the door and peered in.
It was a spare little working-class flat, though opulent by the standards I had once lived under. There were antimacassars on the backs of faded stuffed chairs and framed pictures pulled from magazines on the walls. Miriam Smith had worked hard to make the shabby apartment habitable. Everything was spartan but clean. The flat seemed unnaturally still, however, and I had to agree with Inspector Poole's assertion that it had been abandoned.
The room was divided by a screen and a blanket hanging from the ceiling. We moved into the back portion of the room.
'No blood,' Barker noted, looking about. 'She wasn't murdered here, unless Smith cleaned up afterwards.'
'Search the drawers,' Poole suggested, and we immediately began going through everything. Most of the dead woman's personal effects were still here, worn but carefully repaired. The suspect's clothing was gone, as was anything referring to him, save for a certificate of marriage on the wall, from a church in Brighton. There were no photographs and no evidence of where Smith might have gone.
'Scampered,' Poole pronounced. 'I'll have my men take this place apart board by board in the morning, but we're losing valuable time now.' He turned to the crowd. 'Can anyone describe John Smith?'
The crowd pushed forward a hesitant-looking Jewish fellow with long side locks and a cap he was twisting in his hand.
'Sir,' he said gravely to the inspector, wringing his hat until it resembled a challah. 'Sir, I am a street artist. If I could just go get my charcoal and some paper, I could sketch him in just a few minutes.'
'Get your things, by all means,' Poole agreed. The fellow ran downstairs and returned with a piece of butcher's paper and a charcoal pencil. We sat him down in one of the worn dining chairs and left him to reconstruct the man from memory, while we combed the flat for more clues. All we found of interest was Miriam Smith's Bible. It had no bulletin from the Poplar church, but her handwritten name on the dedication page was in the same handwriting as the notes we had, or so Barker pronounced. Miriam Smith was definitely the woman with whom Louis Pokrzywa had been passing messages.
'I've got it,' the street artist called in triumph. The three of us crowded around him and looked into the face of our possible murderer for the first time. It was a square, clean-shaven face, a man of perhaps forty years with a birthmark on his chin. He had typically British features and gave the appearance of a stern, no-nonsense sort of person. It was an intelligent face, and not one I would associate with violent behavior. Most of all, though I did not recognize his face, I somehow felt I had seen him recently, if only I could place just where.
'He matches the description of the man in the park who Da Silva said was speaking against the Jew,' Barker said, turning to Poole. 'I believe this has answered your question, Terry. Whether the deaths were personally motivated or not, this fellow obviously has an agenda against the Jews. I still think he will attempt to force a pogrom if he can.'
When we came out of the building, it was nearing six. Poole was anxious to take the sketch to Scotland Yard, and Barker and I were hungry, neither of us having eaten since breakfast. We parted company, and the Guv and I walked back to the station, where we were able to catch a hansom dropping a fare. I fell asleep in the cab and knew nothing until Barker shook me roughly to say we were at the Elephant and Castle. We were a couple of tired and hungry men as we passed down the lane behind Barker's home and reached for the latch of the back gate. All my thoughts were of a filling dinner and a warm bed. The last thing I expected was for us to be set upon in our own alleyway.
