except as it provided income and thus the means to continue his felonious vocation, though even regarding his recompense, he was far from greedy. Why, receiving three thousand sovereigns for the ring, or its true value of perhaps thirty thousand, or merely a handful of crowns wasn’t the point. No, the allure to Goodcastle was the act of the theft and the perfection of its execution.
One might wonder how exactly he had chosen this curious line of work. Goodcastle’s history revealed some privilege and a fine education. Nor had he rubbed shoulders with any particularly rough crowds at any point in his life. His parents, both long deceased, had been loving, and his brother was, of all things, a parish priest in Yorkshire. He supposed much of the motivation propelling him to steal could be traced to his terrible experiences during the Second Afghan War. Goodcastle had been a gunner with the famed Royal Horse Artillery, which was among the detachments ordered to stop an enemy force of Ghazis intent on attacking the British garrison at Kandahar. On the searingly hot, dusty day of 27 July 1880 the force of 2,500 British and Indian infantry, light cavalry and artillery met the enemy at Maiwand. What they did not realize until the engagement began, however, was that the Afghans outnumbered them ten to one. From the very beginning the battle went badly, for in addition to overwhelming numbers of fanatical troops the enemy had not only smoothbores, but Krupp guns as well. The Ghazis pinpointed their weapons with deadly accuracy and the shells and the blizzard of musket balls and repeater rounds ravaged the British forces.
Manning gun number 3, Goodcastle’s crew suffered terribly but managed to fire over one hundred rounds that day, the barrel of the weapon hot enough to cook flesh — as was proven by the severe burns on his men’s arms and hands. Finally, though, the overwhelming force of the enemy prevailed. With a pincer maneuver they closed in. The Afghans seized the English cannon, which the British had no time to spike and destroy, as well as the unit’s colors — the first time in the history of the British army such a horror had occurred.
As Goodcastle and the others fled in a terrible rout, the Ghazis turned the British guns around and augmented the carnage, with the Afghans using the flagpoles from the regiment’s own flags as ramming rods for the shot!
A horrific experience, yes — twenty percent of the Horse Artillery was lost, as was sixty percent of the 66th Foot Regiment — but in some ways the worst was visited upon the surviving soldiers only after their return to England. Goodcastle found himself and his comrades treated as pariahs, branded cowards. The disdain mystified as much as it devastated their souls. But Goodcastle soon learned the reason for it. Prime Minister Disraeli, backed by a number of lords and the wealthy upper class, had been the prime movers in the military intervention in Afghanistan, which served no purpose whatsoever except to rattle sabers at Russia, then making incursions into the area. The loss at Maiwand made many people question the wisdom of such involvement and was an instant political embarrassment. Scapegoats were needed and who better than the line troops who were present at one of the worst defeats in British history?
One particular nobleman infuriated Goodcastle by certain remarks made to the press, cruelly bemoaning the shame the troops had brought to the nation and offering not a word of sympathy for those who lost life or limb. The shopkeeper was so livid that he vowed revenge. But he’d had enough of death and violence at Maiwand and would never, in any case, injure an unarmed opponent, so he decided to punish the man in a subtler way. He found his residence and a month after the improvident remarks the gentleman discovered that a cache of sovereigns — hidden, not very cleverly, in a vase in his office — was considerably diminished.
Not long after this a factory owner reneged on promises of employment to a half dozen veterans of the Afghan campaign. The industrialist too paid dearly — with a painting, which Goodcastle stole from his summer house in Kent and sold, the proceeds divvied up among those who’d been denied work. (Goodcastle’s experience in his father’s antiquities business stood him in good stead; despite the veterans’ concern about the questionable quality of the canvas, done by some Frenchman named Claude Monet, the thief was able to convince an American dealer to pay dearly for the blurred landscape.)
The vindication these thefts represented certainly cheered him — but Goodcastle finally came to admit that what appealed most deeply wasn’t revenge or the exacting of justice but the exhilaration of the experience itself…. Why, a well-executed burglary could be a thing of beauty, as much so as any hand-carved armoire or Fragonard painting or William Tessler gold broach. He tamed his guilt and began pursuing his new calling with as much vigor and cunning as was displayed by all men, in whatever profession, who were counted successful.
Once he inherited the familial shop on Great Portland Street he found that he and his workers had unique access to the finest homes in metropolitan London, as they collected and delivered furniture — perfect hunting grounds for a refined burglar. He was too clever to rob his own clients, of course, but he would listen and observe, learning what he might about these customers’ neighbors or acquaintances — any recent valuables they’d purchased, sums of money they’d come into, where they might secrete their most precious objects, when they regularly traveled out of London, the number and nature of grooms and waiting-servants and guard hounds.
A brilliant idea, and perfectly executed on many occasions. As on Thursday last in the apartment of Sir Robert Mayhew.
But it is often not the plan itself that goes awry, but an entirely unforseen occurrence that derails a venture. In this case, the unexpected cleverness of Scotland Yard inspectors.
Goodcastle now replaced the Westphalian ring and the other items in the safe and counted the cash inside. Five hundred pounds. At his home in London he had another three thousand sovereigns, plus other valuable items he’d stolen recently but hadn’t yet found buyers for. In his country house was another five thousand quid. That would set him up easily in the southern provinces of France, where he spent time with Lydia, the raven-haired beauty from Manchester he often traveled with. She could join him there permanently when she’d settled her own business affairs.
But living forever in France? His heart sank at the thought. Peter Goodcastle was an Englishman through and through. For all its sooty air from the dark engines of industry, its snobbish elite, its Victorian imperialism, his shabby treatment after Maiwand, he still loved England.
But he would not love ten years in Newgate.
He swung the safe door shut and closed the secret panel, letting the tapestry fall back over it. Caught in furious debate about what he might do, he wandered out into his shop once again, finding comfort in the many fine objects offered for sale.
An hour later, having come to no decision as to a course of action, he was wondering if perhaps he’d been wrong about the prowess of the police. Maybe they had hit on some lucky initial conclusions, but the investigation had perhaps stalled and he would escape unscathed. But it was then that a customer walked into the shop and began to browse. The shopkeeper smiled a greeting then bent over a ledger in concentration but he continued to keep an eye on the customer, a tall, slim man in a black greatcoat over a similarly shaded morning suit and white shirt. He was carefully examining the clocks and music boxes and walking sticks with the eye of someone intent on buying something and getting good value for his money.
As a thief, Peter Goodcastle had learned to be observant of detail; as a shopkeeper he had come to know customers. He was now struck by a curious fact: The man perused only the
Goodcastle then noted something else. The man was subtly running his finger along a crevice in the seam of a music box. So, his interest wasn’t in the wood itself but in the wax covering it, a sample of which he captured under his nail.
The “customer” was not that at all, the shopkeeper understood with dismay; he was one of the Yarders his informant had told him about earlier.
Well, all is not lost yet, Goodcastle reasoned. The wax he used was somewhat rare, due to its price and availability only in commercial quantities, but it was hardly unique; many other furniture and antiquity dealers bought the same substance. This was not by any means conclusive evidence of his guilt.
But then the policeman took a fancy to a red overstuffed chair. He sat on it and patted the sides, as if getting a feel for its construction. He sat back and closed his eyes. In horror Goodcastle noted the man’s right hand disappeared out of sight momentarily and subtly plucked a piece of the stuffing out of the cushion.
The substance was desiccated horsehair, which surely would match the piece found in Robert Mayhew’s apartment.
The inspector rose and prowled up and down the aisles for some moments longer. Finally he glanced toward the counter. “You are Mr. Goodcastle?”
