Depths of Deceit Read Free

contacted him yet, sir, but he’s a man who likes his officers to use their initiative. As soon as we’ve got the body out of this foul place I’ll go and see him. Until then, Mr Box, I regard you as being in charge here.’
    From somewhere in the roadway beyond the gaping entrance to the Mithraeum, the sound of a handbell was heard. At the same time there came an excited murmur from the crowd. PC Gully appeared in the opening, and announced that the police hearse had just turned into Priory Gate Street.
    ‘Sergeant French,’ said Box, ‘I know you’d intended to convey the body to Clerkenwell Mortuary. Instead, would you tell the drivers to take it straight away to Horseferry Road? They’ve more facilities there, and someone I know is duty surgeon there today. It’s a long drag out from here, I know—’
    ‘Say no more, sir,’ said French. ‘Is there anything else you want me to do?’
    ‘I’d like you to lend me PC Gully for half an hour, if you will. He’s a local man, he tells me, and I’d like Sergeant Knollys and me to be given a little tour of this block of buildings before we return to Whitehall.’
    ‘Have him by all means, Mr Box. Ah! Here’s the stretcher partyat last. Now we can get the poor young man decently covered and taken out of this infernal heat.’
     
    When the three policemen emerged blinking into the light, they saw that the persistent crowd of onlookers had moved further up the street to form a reception committee for the police hearse, which had just turned out of Farringdon Lane into Priory Gate Street. Box and Knollys followed PC Gully, who conducted them swiftly in the opposite direction. They passed the stationer’s shop, which was closed and shuttered, and then turned left into a narrow shop-lined street. There were no pavements, and the cobbles were uncomfortable underfoot.
    ‘This is Catherine Lane, sir,’ said PC Gully. ‘As you can see, it’s got a number of jewellers’ shops, and one or two optician’s premises . This place here, on your right, is Mr Gold’s workshop. He’s a wholesale jeweller. Next door to him we have this grand-looking place, sir, with its fancy redbrick front, and a clock in a kind of gable up there, above the gutters. Hatchard’s Furniture Repository, it used to be. It’s been closed for years. And just further on—’
    ‘Just a minute, Constable,’ Box interrupted. ‘Hold your horses, will you? As I see it, this Catherine Lane is one side of a rough square. The first side we saw was Priory Gate Street, with the archaeological site, and the stationer’s next door to it. This Catherine Lane forms the second side of the square, and you’re going to take us along the remaining two sides. Am I right?’
    ‘Yes, sir. It’s like a square, this whole block.’
    ‘And this Hatchard’s Furniture Repository – it looks in very good repair, but you say it’s been closed for years. Curious, that, don’t you think?’
    ‘It is looked after, sir, I’ll admit that. But I remember it being closed while I was still a boy. It’s locked, barred and bolted, and quite empty inside. You can see through some of the windows at the back if you jump up and down, and look through the bars. Weused to dare each other to climb up on to the roof when I was a boy. There are skylights up there.’
    ‘Dear me!’ said Box. ‘I’m sorry to hear that you had a disreputable past, PC Gully. So it’s been empty for years?’
    ‘It has, sir,’ said Gully, smiling in spite of himself. ‘And we only dared each other. We never actually climbed up there. Now here, beside Hatchard’s you’ll see this narrow back crack, which is called Miller’s Alley. This is by way of being the third side of your square, Mr Box.’
    They followed Gully along a narrow path between the windowless flank of the furniture repository and another dismal blind wall to their left. Miller’s Alley was strewn with the detritus of decay: pieces of blackened brick, the charred remnants