The Thieves' Labyrinth (Albert Newsome 3) Read Free

you—’
    ‘No matter. Did you look in the gentleman’s pockets once he had expired?’
    ‘Certainly not! What are you suggesting?’
    ‘Nothing at all. I am asking a simple question for which I require an answer.’
    ‘I did not, and the Bridge Company can speak for my good character if anyone maintains anything to the contrary. Am I a suspect in your investigation, Mr Batchem?’
    ‘In any investigation, one does not limit oneself to whom one suspects. The evidence is the silent witness and it alone is to be understood. You were the last to see the man alive, is that
right?’
    ‘I and the murderer.’
    ‘You will not speak of murder to anyone once you leave this place. It is not for you to decide. I am the one in possession of all information – not you. Now, look at this earring I
found in a recess. Do you recognize it?’
    ‘How would I? I do not examine the ears of every person who passes through my barrier each day. As long as the toll is correct—’
    ‘Please answer simply “yes” or “no”.’
    ‘No. People leave things on the bridge every day. I have a cupboard full of them here. Sometimes they come back asking after their lost articles – mostly they do not.’
    ‘I see. I trust you have been directed by Mr Blackthorne not to speak to any police constables?’
    ‘Yes, sir.’
    ‘Good. The police are poor investigators and I would not like them to muddy the waters. I go now to examine the body. Thereafter, the verdict will become public knowledge. Good day to
you.’
    And with that, Eldritch Batchem stood, made a curious bow, and walked without further pause into the passing crowds, his russet cap visible for just a few moments before he vanished into the
crowd.
    Toll-collector Weeton now felt the fatigue of the night’s experiences settle heavily on him. He picked up his book, took his hat, bade goodbye to the daytime toll-collector and set off
south along the bridge to his home in Lambeth.
    At mid-span, though, he had occasion to pause in interest. It was hereabouts that Eldritch Batchem had been making his earlier investigation. No visible trace of the incident now remained among
the dung and dirt trodden by the traffic, but he leaned on the cold stone balustrade to linger where the man had died.
    Daylight had arrived but weakly and light-grey cloud was striated with blue over the city. At this hour, the great chimneys of Southwark were still largely idle and the black pall of a million
household flues had not yet obscured the vista. St Paul’s towered above all in sculptural eminence, and countless black spires raked a distant band of pellucid horizon soon to be lost in
smoke. Over to the east, the slender Monument caught a flicker of nascent sun and briefly flashed its gilded crest. Here was the greatest city on earth, seemingly empty from this vantage, but
seething with life.
    And death. As if remembering something, Weeton took his book – a rather torrid tale – from a pocket and turned to the page he had folded on hearing the scream. He put his finger on
the very sentence interrupted by that incident and traced it again:
    Horror hides in darkness, and every heart resides in endless Night.
    People passed – strangers all – walking with their own concerns along that patch of fatal roadway. Few knew of the crime at that time. In following days, however, that single death
would become just one element in a far more terrible series of events.

TWO

    There were some who might have asked why Inspector Albert Newsome of the Metropolitan Police’s Detective Force had not been the investigator walking about Waterloo-bridge
that morning. Had he known of the incident, he would have been asking the same.
    In fact, the inspector was sitting in a Thames Police galley beneath London-bridge at the very moment the toll-collector was making his way home. Perhaps it was the early hour, or the chill down
on the water, or the stiff blue uniform he was unaccustomed to wearing, but the