The Gang of St Bride's, page 11
part #9 of Penny Green Series
“The police are looking for her,” I said. “Do you know where she might be?”
“Nope.”
“But you’ve heard of her?”
“Ev’ryone’s ’eard of ’er.”
“Have you ever seen her?”
“Nope. And I don’t know nothin’ about ’er, neither, so don’t go askin’ me no more questions about ’er.”
“Does Miss Danby ever mention her?”
“No, she don’t.”
“She runs the gang, though, doesn’t she? With the help of eleven others, perhaps?”
“I dunno. Like I told yer before, I only know Miss Danby.”
“But you also knew the murdered girls?”
“I’ve seen ’em about.”
“How do you know they were murdered by gang members?”
“Cos we got warned! We’ve bin told the same thing could ’appen to us.”
“Then you’re quite sure the two girls were murdered by the gang?”
“Yeah, that’s what I told yer.”
“And you’ve no idea who the second girl was?”
She shook her head. “Nope.”
I gave a frustrated sigh. “I think you could be of enormous help to us, Sarah, but there must be something more you can tell me. Where can we find Miss Danby?”
“I ain’t sayin’. I won’t go gettin’ meself in no trouble.” She lowered her voice. “I didn’t come ’ere to ’ave all these questions asked o’ me. I come ’ere cos there’s summat yer might wanna see. I need yer ’elp, but it’ll ’elp yer, too. I’m sure of it.”
She lifted her shawl, revealing a small purse tied around her waist. She unbuttoned the purse and pulled out a folded piece of paper.
“What is it?” I asked.
“’Ave a read.”
She handed the paper over. I opened it out and smoothed it flat on the eiderdown covering my bed. At first glance, I appeared to be looking at a poem. Written out in a careful, almost childlike hand, it read:
There’s a friendly hostelry on every corner,
Call at the one with our best-known mourner.
From the Order of Preachers, cross the Thames,
The Lapis Milliaris is one of our gems.
A letter to the Galtans is widely read,
And the Earl of Pemboke rests his head.
But Hamlet no longer treads the boards,
What can you poach for royal rewards?
“A riddle,” I said, “but what’s it for?”
“To ’elp us find ’em. The ones who’s runnin’ the gang.”
“But how? I don’t understand.”
“Yer ’ave ter solve each line, and when yer’ve done that yer can find ’em.”
“How?”
“I dunno. I s’pose yer find out after yer’ve done it.”
“You don’t know the answer yourself?”
“Course not! That’s why I’ve come ’ere with it.”
“Where did you get this from?”
“I took it off Miss Danby, only she don’t know I’ve got it. I’ll be in fer it if she finds out.”
“Why did you take the risk?”
“Cos the riddle leads to a place… I know that much. It’s an ’ideaway. If yer can get to all the people who’s there yer got yerself the murderers.”
“Why does the riddle exist in the first place?”
“It’s fer members o’ the gang to prove ’emselves. If they can work it out, they get ter be one of ’em.”
“One of whom?”
“Them ones in charge. Like Rosie Gold.”
“You’re admitting she’s the queen now?”
Sarah shrugged.
“Did Rosie Gold write this riddle?” I asked.
“I dunno who’s wrote it, but I ain’t clever enough fer it. I got no chance o’ workin’ it out. But I can tell yer clever, Miss Green. I reckon yer can do it.”
I glanced down at the riddle again. “I’m not convinced that I can.”
“Sure yer can! Yer write for the noospapers. Yer one o’ them clever folks.”
I gave a laugh. “There are many people who are far cleverer than me.”
“Yer went to school, didn’t yer?”
“I did. Didn’t you?”
“I went to one o’ them industrial schools where yer gotta live there. Me ma was bad wi’ the drink and I was fendin’ fer meself.”
“And your father?”
“I never known ’im.”
“Have you any brothers or sisters?”
“Yeah, two brothers, but they got sent off some other place. Dunno where they are now. I ran away from school cos the teachers bin cruel there. Beat us even when we ’adn’t done nothin’ wrong jus’ cos they felt like it.”
“That’s not right.”
“I know it ain’t! That’s why I ’ad ter run away. Then Miss Danby found me an’ told me she ’ad some work fer me. Weren’t no one else gonna ’elp me, were they? Anyone else woulda tried ter send me back ter that school again. I started thievin’ cos that’s what Miss Danby wanted off me. She’s gave me a roof over me ’ead, so I ’ad no choice. It were either thievin’ or ’ave men pay fer me company and I weren’t doin’ that.”
“I’m sorry to hear you’ve had such a difficult time, Sarah.”
“It ain’t your fault, Miss Green, and I ain’t gonna feel sorry for meself neither. At least I ain’t in the river like them two girls. But I don’t want no part in that gang no more. I wanna make a better woman o’ meself one way or another. I don’t want no more o’ them girls gettin’ murdered. What’s ’appened ter them could of ’appened ter any of us! We’re livin’ in fear and it ain’t right!”
Her eyes were round and impassioned, and I felt great sympathy for her plight.
“More of ’em’s gonna die, I jus’ know it.”
“The police will help,” I said. “They’ll put a stop to it.”
She gave a shrug. “If yer say so. What d’yer think o’ the riddle? D’yer reckon yer can solve it?”
I read through it again. “No solution immediately comes to mind. ‘Earl of Pemboke’ is surely meant to read ‘Earl of Pembroke’, don’t you think?”
“I got no idea.”
“You’ve given me this so we can find out who leads the gang and then they can be arrested for murdering the two girls, is that right?”
“Yeah.”
“It would be far easier if I could speak to Miss Danby directly.”
“But she don’t know I got it!”
“I could pretend that I know nothing about the riddle.”
“I ain’t tellin’ yer where she is, neither. I’ve given yer the riddle and that’s the end of it. I don’t wanna be endin’ up in the river meself.”
“The riddle may take a long time to solve,” I said. “Why not speak to my good friend Inspector Blakely? He can protect you from the gang.”
“I don’t want nothin’ to do wi’ no coppers.”
“But you wouldn’t be in any trouble.”
“I don’t speak to ’em!” She jumped to her feet.
“All right, Sarah.” I wondered if there was anything I could do to persuade her otherwise, but she seemed quite resolute. “You’ll need to tell me where I can find you in case I need your help with this.”
“I won’t be no ’elp.” She walked over to the door. “I’ll come find yer if I need ter.”
Chapter 23
“Inspector Paget from C Division and Sergeant Bradshaw from the Thames River Police are meeting today to discuss the two murders,” said James as we travelled on the underground railway toward Gower Street station. “They’re working on Sarah’s suggestion that the two girls in the river were members of the Twelve Brides gang, but we have to be careful as we only have her word for it. We need further evidence.”
“She seemed quite adamant about it, and I must say I believe her.”
“Why so?”
“Because she clearly knows about the gang. I pulled the riddle out of my bag and handed it to him. She gave me this.”
He glanced down at it. “A poem?”
“No, not a poem,” I laughed. “It’s a riddle. Sarah visited yesterday evening and gave it to me. She said it would lead us to the senior members of the Twelve Brides gang. I’m sure that would include Rosie Gold.”
Once I had explained all that Sarah had told me, James read though the riddle again with a furrowed brow.
“We don’t have time for silly puzzles,” he said, handing the piece of paper back to me.
“But it may help us find Rosie Gold!” I protested.
“And you really believe that, do you? This Sarah woman may just be playing a game with you. She claims to be a member of the Twelve Brides, then refuses to reveal anything worthwhile about herself and gives you a riddle that was probably copied from the pages of The Family Gazette.”
I stared down at the piece of paper in my hand, suddenly feeling rather downcast.
“Why is she involving you in the first place?” continued James.
“She thought I might be able to help with the riddle, not that any of it makes any sense to me. Sarah told me she doesn’t trust the police, like a good many other people from her background, but if you could just meet with her—”
“She won’t allow me to. She obviously mistrusts me.”
“But if you could, you would see her for what she is: a young woman recruited by a gang she no longer wishes to be a part of. She heard about the murders of the two girls and feels worried that the same fate might befall her. And I can’t say that I’m surprised. She’s rather similar to them, wouldn’t you say? She’s young and vulnerable, and she became part of the gang because there were so few choices available to her. Now she’s doing what she can to help without getting herself into trouble. By solving the riddle and reaching the gang’s senior members we can find whoever murdered the two girls.”
James’ face softened a little as he listened. “It all seems rather odd to me.”
“It is rather odd, but what if I choose to ignore her? How do we know whether to dismiss the riddle or not? We could end up missing out on something.”
“I’d be very careful about placing any trust in Sarah if I were you.”
“I never said that I trusted her.”
“But you believe her?”
“Only because of the riddle. Sarah couldn’t have written it herself; she doesn’t have the level of education required to do so.”
“She might have copied it from somewhere.”
“I suppose we can’t rule the idea out, but does that mean we should completely ignore it? Aren’t you at least a little intrigued to find out where it leads us?”
The train pulled into Gower Street station and we disembarked.
“I really think we should try to find the answer to the riddle,” I shouted to James over the sound of slamming carriage doors and jets of steam. “We have nothing to lose.”
“Other than time,” he shouted back.
“I’ll make time,” I replied as we jostled our way toward the steps leading out of the station.
We arrived at Euston station with plenty of time to meet Eliza and Francis on their return journey from Derbyshire. Eliza had sent me a telegram to let me know which train they would be travelling on, and James and I were keen to hear how their visit had gone.
A porter told us the train had been held up and would be arriving twenty minutes late. We waited in the station’s high-ceilinged dining room, within which murmured conversations mixed with the clatter of crockery and cutlery.
“Let’s have another look at it, then,” James said resignedly.
“At the riddle you believe to be a waste of time, you mean?”
“It is a waste of time when there are more important things to be getting on with, but seeing as we’ve some time to kill it makes sense to take a quick look.”
“I agree.” I pulled the piece of paper out of my bag and laid it down on the table between us. “And who knows? Perhaps we’ll have it solved before Eliza and Francis arrive.”
James gave a cynical laugh. “I doubt that very much.”
We both read through the riddle again. “‘There’s a friendly hostelry on every corner’,” said James. “That first line is rather meaningless, isn’t it? There’s not a lot we can do with that.”
“‘Call at the one with our best-known mourner’,” I added.
“Who would the chief mourner be?”
“I’ve no idea. The Order of Preachers… have you heard of them?”
“I can’t say I have.”
“‘Cross the Thames’. That must be a bridge.”
“Or a ferry of some sort.”
“Yes, it could be. There’s the Tower Subway to consider, too. That’s close to the Tower of London. Could the tower have something to do with the Order of Preachers?”
“The Order of Preachers has religious connotations,” said James. “Was there ever a religious order at the Tower of London?”
“I don’t know.”
I skimmed through the rest of the riddle, searching for something that looked familiar.
“‘Pemboke’ must be ‘Pembroke’,” I said. “The Earl of Pembroke is well known, isn’t he? He was a politician at one time and continues to air his views publicly in speeches and periodicals. ‘Rests his head’. Do you think that could be a reference to his home?”
“Quite possibly.”
“I suppose we’ll need to find out where he lives, in that case. He no doubt owns a property in London as well as a family seat somewhere else. But I still don’t understand the riddle. Even if we succeed in finding out where the Earl of Pembroke lives, what then?”
“I’m not sure,” replied James. “And as he no doubt has more than one home, how do we know which the riddle refers to?”
“‘Hamlet no longer treads the boards’. The play must have been performed at one of the theatres recently. I can look up the listings in the Morning Express.”
“Is Lapis Milliaris a type of jewel?” asked James. “Perhaps it refers to a famous diamond of some sort. The name sounds Latin to me, but unfortunately Latin wasn’t my strongest subject at school.”
“We could ask Francis. He knows Latin.”
“Of course he does.”
“He may be able to help us with the rest of the riddle, in fact,” I said. “We haven’t done particularly well with it so far, have we?”
“Riddles are supposed to be difficult. There’s a method to these things, and it often involves reading between the lines.”
“How does one do that, exactly?”
“Mull it over, dwell on it for a while and something will eventually come to mind.”
“I see. Who are the Galtans?”
“I have no idea.”
“A family? A colony?”
“I can’t say I’ve ever heard of them.”
“I think we should ask Francis to have a look at this for us. I’m sure he’ll be able to help.”
“He may be able to identify what the riddle refers to, but can he surmise what is to be done with it? That last line means nothing at all. to me It says, ‘What can you poach for Royal rewards?’”
“I’m sure it’ll mean something once we’ve deciphered the rest.”
“Hopefully it will, but what are we supposed to do with it then?”
“I’m hoping it should be fairly obvious by that stage,” I said. “Once we’ve solved the riddle, we can tell Sarah the solution and then she can gain access to the secret headquarters of the gang. Perhaps Rosie Gold will be there herself.”
“It sounds like a fair arrangement if she keeps her promise,” said James. “We’ll need to offer her some sort of protection when the time comes. Given the deaths of the two girls in the river it’s quite evident what Sarah’s fate would be if they heard she had shared this riddle with people from outside the gang.”
“We must look after her if she’s willing to help us.”
“I’m still not sure how she’ll benefit from the riddle being solved.”
“She told me she wants justice. The deaths of Josephine and the other girl have upset her greatly and she wants it all to stop.”
James gave a laugh. “I’m quite sure there must be a quicker way of telling us what we need to know without passing on this bewildering riddle!”
“I agree, but she feels too afraid to talk openly about the gang at the moment. Giving us this riddle was all she felt safe with at the moment, and I think it’s the only option left open to us.”
“The only option is to spend hours puzzling over this incomprehensible rhyme? Let’s not forget about all the other work we need to be doing, Penny. We don’t have a great deal of time to spend looking at this.”
“Francis can help us.”
“Francis Edwards comes to the rescue again!”
“There’s no need to be facetious. If he’s willing to help we’d be foolish to turn him down.”
“Let’s wait and see whether he’s survived his visit to your mother first.”
Chapter 24
“We were too late, weren’t we, Francis?” said Eliza.
The newly arrived pair had joined us in the station dining room.
“Yes, we were,” replied Francis. “A neighbour of Mrs Green’s had visited her with a copy of the Derby Telegraph, which had, unfortunately, spilled the beans about Mr Green’s indiscretions.”
“Oh goodness,” I said, feeling a horrible heaviness in my chest. “And how did Mother respond to it?”
“She was in surprisingly good spirits,” replied my sister, “although she called him a lot of unpleasant names. I wasn’t aware Mother even knew some of those words!”
“It was quite astonishing to hear,” added Francis. “But fairly well justified, given the circumstances.”
“She was pleased to hear that Father isn’t dead,” continued Eliza, “and she wasn’t quite as angry as I’d expected.”
“That is a surprise!” I said.
“In actual fact, Mother had something rather interesting to say to me, Penelope. She told me she had wanted to mention it before but it wouldn’t have been appropriate given the possibility that Father wasn’t dead.”
