Depths of Deceit Read Free Page B

Rents
    W hen Box and Knollys had taken formal leave of Sergeant French and PC Gully, they walked down Leather Lane and into Holborn Circus, where they hailed an omnibus that would take them to Whitehall. Despite a further episode of thunder spots, Box assured Knollys that it was not going to rain that day. They mounted to the empty upper deck.
    â€˜The sky’s all wrong for rain, Sergeant,’ said Box as they settled themselves on one of the wooden-slatted seats. ‘And besides, it would be stifling inside on a day like this. All that straw, and hot bodies. Did you know, Sergeant, that in this great metropolis of ours, nine hundred tons of horse-droppings are deposited on the carriageways every day?’
    â€˜No, I didn’t know that, sir,’ said Knollys, ‘but I can well imagine it. It’s certainly very olfactory today.’
    â€˜Olfactory? What does that mean? Did you invent it?’
    â€˜It means smelly, sir. It’s in the dictionary.’
    Box took his notebook from a pocket, and rapidly flicked through the pages.
    â€˜Let’s forget all about horse-droppings, pagan gods and temples, Jack,’ he said, ‘and concentrate on the murdered man, Mr Gregory Walsh, B.Sc., Assayer and Sampler, whose home is at 5 Hayward’s Court. Or maybe it’s his business premises. Now, we can leave it to “G” to inform the next of kin, and prepare themfor a visit from you, tomorrow. Find out what he was doing at the Mithraeum. Funny name, isn’t it? Sounds like a music hall. See if you can establish any connection between Walsh and this professor – what’s his name? Ainsworth. We’ll have to talk to the professor, too, before many more days have elapsed.’
    The iron tyres of the horse-omnibus screeched as they passed over the cobbles at the junction of Fetter Lane and Fleet Street. Above the all-pervading ring of traffic, they would both hear the menacing roll of thunder.
    â€˜What will you do, sir?’ asked Knollys.
    â€˜Me? Well, the first thing I’ll do when we get back to the Rents is see if PC Mackenzie’s in his telegraph cabin, and get him to send a wire to young Dr Donald Miller, who’s on duty at Horseferry Road Mortuary today. I want him to perform an immediate post-mortem . You remember Dr Miller, don’t you? He came out to Corunna Lands last year, to examine the body of poor PC Lane. I’ll call on Miller early this evening, and hear what he has to tell us.’
    They had reached the Strand, and the traffic was becoming very dense. The sky was rapidly blackening, and the hot air of the August day was turning humid.
    â€˜And another thing, Jack,’ said Box. ‘I’m going to send Sergeant Kenwright to go through that Mithraeum with a fine-tooth comb. And while he’s there, he can make drawings of that stone reredos, and any other little detail that takes his fancy. You know how good he is at that sort of thing, and— Ah! Whitehall, at last!’
    As Box and Knollys rose from their seats, there came a flash of sheet lightning, followed by a terrifying clap of thunder. The heavens opened, and in seconds both men were soaked to the skin. Clattering down the open staircase, they jumped off the moving vehicle into Whitehall.
    As they hurried down the little narrow street called Great Scotland Yard, Arnold Box could see the old entrance to ‘A’ Division, where, until four years earlier, members of the publichad come when they’d wanted to ‘see a policeman’. It was in actual fact the back entrance to Number 4, Whitehall Place, the old office of the Metropolitan Police Commissioners.
    Three years earlier, the Metropolitan Police had removed themselves , lock, stock and barrel, from their festering collection of cramped old houses in Whitehall Place and its environs, and had taken up residence in the gleaming new fairy palace on the Embankment, known as New Scotland Yard.
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