Burning Lamp Read Free Page B

both the good and bad neighborhoods. He had no difficulty comprehending the map. In fact, he could have drawn it.
    Delbert possessed a sense of direction as well as a photographic memory of every location he had ever visited that was, in Griffin’s opinion, probably psychical in nature. Delbert scoffed at the notion, although he took Griffin’s talent for granted, just as Jed and Leggett did. To his men, Griffin knew, he was simply the Boss and, as such, he was expected to be different.
    Delbert, Jed and Leggett were among the first members of the crew of young street thieves whom Griffin had recruited into his fledgling gang two decades earlier. They had all left the streets a long time ago. Now the three enforcers supervised and guarded the household.
    Delbert was in charge of the kitchens. Jed took care of the grounds and the dogs and served as coachman. Leggett shouldered the responsibilities that would normally have fallen to a butler. A laundry maid came in twice a week and other day staff was employed as required, but all of the outsiders worked under strict supervision. None spent the night. Griffin was not concerned that someone might try to pinch the silver. The house held secrets, however, and he was single-mindedly obsessive when it came to concealing them. He had not become one of the most powerful crime lords in London by being careless.
    Although Jed, Delbert and Leggett kept the big house running smoothly, that was not their primary responsibility. In reality they were Griffin’s lieutenants. Each was charged with overseeing a specific aspect of the empire that Griffin had built.
    The ragtag band of thieves he had formed years ago had matured into a well-organized business enterprise with a variety of holdings. Its tentacles reached deep into London’s grittier neighborhoods and also into its most respectable streets. In the past several years Griffin had discovered that he had a knack for investing. He owned shares in a number of banking, shipping, and railroad companies and with those shares had come even more power.
    None of his neighbors on St. Clare Street was aware that the big house built on the ruins of the ancient Abbey belonged to one of the most notorious figures in the city’s criminal underworld. To those in the nearby mansions the owner of the pile of stone at the end of the street was simply a wealthy, if decidedly eccentric, recluse.
    “You’re still convinced that it’s a woman who is organizing the raids?” Delbert asked, forehead wrinkling a little as he studied the map.
    “There is no doubt in my mind,” Griffin said.
    Delbert removed his spectacles and put them carefully back into his pocket. “Well, I’ll say this much for her, she’s moving up in the world. The Peacock Lane and the Avery Street whorehouses are a good deal more elegant than the first three she hit. Do you think she knows that the latest two are owned by Luttrell?”
    “I’d stake the Abbey on it. I’m sure she’s had her sights set on Luttrell’s brothels all along. The first three raids on the small, independent houses were staged to gain experience. Like any good general, she learned from those raids and refined her tactics. From now on, she’ll concentrate on Luttrell’s operations. She is nothing if not ambitious.”
    “That’s a social reformer for you. No common sense at all.” Delbert clicked his teeth in a tut-tutting sound. “Probably doesn’t realize what kind of viper she’s dealing with.”
    “She knows. That’s why she’s hitting his operations. Social reformers seem to be convinced that they are somehow protected by the righteousness of their cause. It would never occur to our little brothel raider that Luttrell would not hesitate to slit her throat.”
    “She appears to be focusing all of her attention on the whorehouses,” Delbert mused.
    “That’s been obvious from the very first newspaper accounts.”
    Delbert shrugged. “No need for us to be concerned, in that case. We