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To the good people of Haslemere Avenue

and 33P. Late 80s, early 90s.

Author note

In the 1890s, the terms ‘idiot’ and ‘imbecile’ were used to refer to people we now describe as having learning, developmental or intellectual disabilities. Down’s syndrome was known as ‘Mongolism’ and people with the condition were often called ‘Mongolian Idiots’, ‘Mongoloids’ or ‘Mongols’. Although it’s uncomfortable to hear these labels nowadays, the term ‘Down’s syndrome’ only came into use in the 1960s.

Contents

Cover

About the Author

Title Page

Copyright

Note to Readers

Praise

Dedication

Author Note

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Six

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty-One

Chapter Forty-Two

Chapter Forty-Three

Chapter Forty-Four

Chapter Forty-Five

Chapter Forty-Six

Chapter Forty-Seven

Chapter Forty-Eight

Historical Notes and Sources

Acknowledgements

Extract

About the Publisher

Chapter One

South London, 1896

Horror sometimes arrives with a smile upon her face, and so it was with the case of Birdie Barclay. It was early New Year, the mud frozen in the streets, smuts drifting like black snow in the fog. Shuddering horses trudged past, driven on to places they didn’t want to go by sullen, red-faced men. Crossing sweepers stood by waiting for punters to drop them a coin, while old folk clutched walls and railings lest they should slip on the slick cobbles, sighing, muttering, hacking up big gobs of germs and firing them into the piles of horse dung as collected at every corner.

We hadn’t had a case for five weeks, so the letter from Mr Barclay inviting us to call that afternoon was welcome. He lived on Saville Place, a row of two-bedroom cottages under the train lines between the Lambeth Palace and Bethlem. When we reached the house we could hear a lady inside singing over a piano. I was about to knock when the guvnor touched my arm.

‘Wait, Barnett,’ he whispered.

We stood on the doorstep listening, the fog bunched thick around us. It was a song you’d often hear in the pubs near closing time, but never had I heard it sang so very fine and sad, so full of loneliness: ‘In the gloaming, oh my darling, when the lights are dim and low, and the quiet shadows falling, softly come and softly go.’ As it built to the refrain, the guvnor shut his eyes and swayed with the chords, his face like a hog at stool. Then, when the last line came, he started singing himself, flat and out of time, drowning out the lady’s mournful voice: ‘When the winds are sobbing faintly, with a gentle unknown woe, will you think of me and love me, as you did once long ago?’

I think it was the only line he knew, the line that spoke most direct to his own battered heart, and he ended in a choke and a tremble. I reached out to squeeze his fat arm. Finally, he opened his eyes and nodded for me to knock.

A broad, pink-faced fellow opened the door. The first thing you noticed was his Malmsey nose, round at the end and coated in fine fur like a gooseberry; beneath it the thick moustache was black though the hair around his bald scalp was white. He greeted us in a nervy voice and led us through to the front room, where a tall woman stood next to a pianoforte. She was Spanish or Portuguese or somesuch, dressed in black from head to toe.

‘These are the detective agents, my dear,’ he said, wringing his hands in excitement. ‘Mr Arrowood, Mr Barnett, this is my wife, Mrs Barclay.’

On hearing our names a warm smile broke over her face, and I could see from the way the guvnor bowed and put his hand flat on his chest that he felt humbled by the lady: by her singing, her deep brown eyes, the kindness in her expression. She bade us sit on the couch.

The small parlour was packed out with furniture too big for it. The pianoforte was jammed between a writing desk and a glass-fronted cabinet. The couch touched the armchair. A gilded Neptune clock took up most of the mantel, its tick ringing out maddeningly loud.

‘Now,’ said the guvnor, ‘how about you tell us your difficulty and we’ll see what we can do to help?’

‘It’s our daughter, Birdie, sir,’ said Mr Barclay. ‘She was married six months ago into a farming family, but since the wedding we’ve heard nothing from her. Nothing at all. No visits, no letters, not even this Christmas last. I’ve twice tried to call for her but they wouldn’t even let me in the house! Said she’s out visiting. Well, sir, it simply cannot be true.’

‘Surely young ladies visit?’ asked the guvnor.

‘She’s not the type to visit, sir. If you knew her you’d understand that. We’ve been driven wild with worry, Mr Arrowood. It’s as if she’s disappeared.’

‘Did you have a quarrel before the wedding? It can be a very upsetting occasion.’

‘She isn’t like that,’ answered Mrs Barclay. Against her husband’s nerves she was a woman of great calm. Her long face was tan; her black hair fell loose down her back. Three small moles dripped from one eye down the side of her cheek. Noticing me watching, her humble smile returned. ‘Birdie never quarrels. She’ll do what you say even if it hurts her, that’s why we’re so concerned. She’d never cut us off. We think they must be preventing her.’

‘Very worrying,’ said the guvnor, nodding his great potato head. His side-hair was tangled and stiff; his belly strained the buttons of his shabby astrakhan coat. He took out his notebook and pen. ‘Now, tell us about her husband. Leave nothing out.’

‘Walter Ockwell’s his name,’ said Mr Barclay. His hands flitched as if it irked him to speak of his son-in-law. ‘The family own a pig farm outside Catford. We don’t trust the man. He’s odd, and not in the usual farmer way either. I can’t describe it any better. Doesn’t meet your eye. We didn’t know it before the wedding but he’s had a spell in prison for clubbing a man half to death in a fight. The parson told me when I was last there. Hit him so hard on the side of the head the eye just exploded. Shattered the cavity, you see. The eye was hanging down his cheek on a bit of string.’ Mr Barclay shuddered. ‘Well, sir! That parson might have told us before the wedding, don’t you think? And if that wasn’t enough, it turns out he’s been married before. The poor woman passed over some two years past.’

The guvnor stopped writing and gave me a look.

‘How did she die?’ he asked.

‘A wagon fell onto her, that’s what the parson says. We went to the police, but they were no help. Sergeant Root told us Birdie’d likely see us when she was good and ready. That’s why we’ve come to you, sir. It could be he’s hurt her and they don’t want us to know.’

The guvnor’s face was grim. Gone was the warm smile.

‘And you haven’t heard from her even once?’

‘It’s as if she’s disappeared. She might be dead for all we know.’

‘Who else lives on the farm, sir?’

‘There are five of them. The mother’s bed-bound. Rosanna’s the sister, she’s not married, and Godwin the brother, and his wife Polly. It was the sister wouldn’t let me in both times. I asked for Walter but he was away in the north somewhere looking at pigs. There was no welcome there for me, I can tell you. I demanded she let me in but she out and out refused. What could I do? I told her to ask Birdie to visit us on a matter of urgency but I don’t know if she even got the message. Same with our letters. Do you see, sirs? Our daughter’s become a ghost!’

‘How did she meet her husband, if I may ask?’ asked the guvnor.

‘We had an introduction from an associate at my firm. We wanted a better match but her mind was set. And also—’ Here he glanced at his wife. ‘We weren’t sure another man would have her.’

‘Dunbar!’ she cried.

‘The agents must know everything, dear.’ He turned back to us, the pressure gone from his voice. ‘Birdie suffered some damage coming into this world and never quite developed fully. She needs a lot of guidance. The doctor called it amentia. Weak-minded, in other words. Walter’s not too far off either, I’d say. We both thought that, didn’t we, dear?’

‘She’s mentally defective?’ asked the guvnor, writing in his pad.

‘She’s only mild,’ said Mrs Barclay. ‘She understands perfectly well though she’s a bit slow with her talking. You wouldn’t know from looking at her and she’s a good worker: they’ve no cause for complaint there. She’ll do just what she’s told.’

‘And what would you like us to do?’

‘We want you to bring her back home,’ replied Mr Barclay, stepping over to his wife but then changing his mind and retreating to the fire.

‘What if she doesn’t want to be brought, sir? What then?’

‘She doesn’t know her own mind, Mr Arrowood,’ said Mr Barclay. ‘She’ll believe anyone, do whatever they say. If they’ve turned her against us, we need to get her away from them. If we can get her back here we’ve a doctor who’ll swear that the marriage’s invalid due to her being mentally unsound. We can have it annulled.’

‘You want us to kidnap her, Mr Barclay?’ asked the guvnor in his sweetest voice.

‘It’s not kidnapping if it’s for the parents.’

‘I’m afraid it is, sir.’

‘At least find out if she’s safe,’ said Mrs Barclay, her voice a-quaver. She dabbed the corners of her eyes with a handkerchief. ‘That she’s not mistreated.’

The guvnor nodded and patted her hand. ‘We can do that, madam.’

He tapped me on the knee.

‘The price is twenty shillings a day plus expenses,’ I said. ‘Two days in advance for a case as this.’

As I spoke, the guvnor hauled himself to his feet and stepped over to inspect a picture of a sailing ship hanging by the door. Though he was tight with his money and often short of it, Arrowood never liked asking for payment. He had a high opinion of himself, and was ashamed to be the sort of gentleman who needed compensation for his services.

‘If it only takes a day we’ll repay you what we haven’t used,’ I said as Mr Barclay pulled a purse from his waistcoat and counted the coins. ‘We’re honest. No one’ll tell you any different.’

When it was done, the guvnor turned away from the picture.

‘How long have you lived here, madam?’

‘How long?’ asked Mrs Barclay, glancing at her husband.

‘Oh, a few years,’ he said, leaning his elbow on the high mantelpiece then jerking if off again as if he’d landed it on a hot plate. ‘Perhaps five.’

‘Five years,’ nodded the guvnor.

‘Yes, it’s a respectable area. Kipling’s brother lived on this street, you know.’

‘Well, well, how wonderful,’ muttered the guvnor. ‘May I ask what your profession is, sir?’

‘I’m senior clerk with an insurance agent, sir.’

‘Tasker and Sons,’ said his wife. ‘Dunbar’s been with them twenty-two years. And I’m a singing instructor.’

‘You have a delightful voice, madam,’ said the guvnor. ‘We heard you earlier.’

‘She was taught by Mrs Welden. My wife was one of her best. She’s sung with Irene Adler at the Oxford: Lord Ulverston paid her a special compliment.’

‘That was a few years ago,’ murmured Mrs Barclay, dropping her eyes. She went to the little writing desk and opened it, pulling out a bright blue peacock’s feather. ‘When you see Birdie, give her this. Tell her I love her and miss her.’

‘And tell her I’ll buy her a new dress to match it when she comes back,’ added her husband.

The guvnor nodded. ‘We’ll do our best to help you. You did the right thing calling us.’

Before leaving, they gave us a photograph of Birdie and directions to the farm. As we walked down Saville Place, a boy with two scarves wrapped around his head came towards us out of the fog.

‘Hey lad,’ asked the guvnor, pointing back at the little house. ‘D’you know where they’ve gone, the people who lived there before the Barclays?’

‘Mr Avery’s gone to Bedford, sir,’ replied the boy, his breath coming out white from his mouth, his hands clasped under his armpits for warmth. ‘You want the address? My mum’ll have it.’

‘No, thank you. And when did the Barclays move in?’

‘Maybe two month past, sir. Maybe three.’

As we turned into the Lambeth Road, I asked him how he knew.

‘All that furniture was recently bought,’ he replied. He reached inside his waistcoat, pulled out a punnet of chocolate stars and offered me one. They were warm and melting from his having stored them so close to the heat of his chest fat. He took a couple and threw them in his mouth. ‘Not a mark on any of it. When I asked Mrs Barclay how long they’d been there she didn’t seem to know what to say. I thought that very queer. And did you notice the outlines of all those missing pictures where the wallpaper had been protected from the soot? They’d have had a fire in that room for the last few months, so those pictures weren’t long removed. The only one they had was that great ship. I had a look at the wall underneath and there was no picture trace at all, Barnett. It must have been put up recently.’

‘A bit of a guess then, sir.’

He laughed.

‘It’s always a guess, Barnett. Until confirmed. Anyway, we must watch out for those two. They’re hiding something.’

I smiled to myself as we walked. Though it would irk him to hear me say it, he was sometimes more like Sherlock Holmes than he realized. He put the last chocolate star in his mouth and dropped the empty punnet on the street.

‘What d’you think of the case?’ I asked.

‘It could be nothing, but if I were the parent I’d be worried. A weak-minded young woman being prevented seeing her family. A violent husband.’ He licked his fingers and wiped them on his britches. ‘Poor Birdie might be in a lot of trouble. The problem is, I’m not sure what we can do about it.’

Chapter Two

Next morning we took the train from London Bridge. It rattled slow as an ox above the sooty terraces and warehouses of Bermondsey, then out through Deptford, New Cross and Lewisham. The further we got, the more the fog thinned until, just before Ladywell, it wasn’t there no more.

The guvnor put down his paper, opened the document case he’d brought, and pulled out the Barclays’ photograph. It was a picture of five women in summer bonnets standing in a park. Birdie was the shortest of them by some way. She stood open-mouthed between her mother and a young woman whose hand she held. She wore a drab cotton dress, her head tilting to the side as she looked at the young lady next to her. Birdie seemed lost in a pleasant dream.

‘I’m not familiar with the feeble-minded, Barnett,’ he said. He wheezed a little as he talked, his side whiskers spurling from his cheeks like woollen clouds. ‘I’m not sure I’ll know if she’s being coerced. Are they harder to read, d’you think?’

‘There was one lived below when I was growing up,’ I told him. ‘He used to get right cross with things. Don’t think he ever left his old ma.’

‘Little Albert’s the only one I know,’ he said, staring at the photograph. ‘I must say I’ve never felt I understood quite what’s going on in his head. Isabel had a soft spot for him.’

‘Did you hear from her over Christmas?’

The guvnor’s wife, Isabel, had left him a year or so ago and now lived with a lawyer in Cambridge. Recently she’d asked him to petition for a divorce, using her infidelity as grounds. He hadn’t done it.

‘She sent a card,’ he answered with a wave. ‘I think she’s beginning to see through that little swindler.’

‘What did she say?’

‘She asked when the building work would be finished.’

I nodded slowly, holding his gaze.

‘I’m reading between the lines, Barnett!’ he said, a little irritation in his voice. ‘If she’s wondering when our rooms are going to be finished it means she’s thinking about coming back to London. It was always him pushing her into it anyway.’

‘Don’t get your hopes up, sir,’ I said. ‘Remember what happened last time.’

He fell silent. The train stopped between stations and we waited.

‘What did you bring that briefcase for?’ I asked him.

‘I’m going to try something. But I forgot to ask about your Christmas, Barnett. Did you enjoy it?’

I nodded. I’d spent it alone getting hammered in a pub on Bankside where nobody knew me. I couldn’t tell him that, just as I couldn’t tell him why. It had been more than six months, and still I couldn’t tell him.

‘My sister cooked a bird,’ he said. ‘Lewis doesn’t celebrate, of course, although he did eat more than his share. Ettie was off delivering sugar mice to the street children for half the day. Then Lewis was abed with cramps. What a glutton he is, and don’t ask me about my sister. Lord, how that woman can eat. And she’s the cheek to urge me to take purgatives. Ah, that reminds me.’

He reached inside his coat and held out a knitted thing to me.

‘It’s a Christmas gift, Barnett. A muffler. That thing you’re wearing’s in tatters.’

He’d never given me a gift before, and I was touched. I opened it out, a red and grey scarf of thick wool. I wrapped it around my neck.

‘Thank you, sir.’

‘Remember that next Christmas.’ He patted me on the knee and picked up his newspaper again. The train started to move.

‘More on the Swaffam Prior murder,’ he said. ‘They’re calling for the Police Inspector’s dismissal. Look here, a whole column on the poor chap. Damned editor doesn’t understand the nature of evidence. God forbid they ever get hold of one of our cases. And this campaign! The Sheriff of Ely, the Bishop. All sorts of do-gooders. How can they know? I mean really. They assume a fourteen-year-old boy can’t remove an old woman’s head. Tripe! A fourteen-year-old can do anything a man can do.’

He turned the page.

‘Oh Lord,’ he groaned. ‘What’s happened to this paper? That charlatan’s never out of it.’

‘Sherlock Homes again, sir?’

‘He’s been asked to investigate the disappearance of some young Lord from his school. Son of the blooming Duke of Holdernesse. Well, he’ll be right at home there.’ He read on a bit, his purple lips hanging open among the tangle of his whiskers. ‘What? No! Oh, Lord. Oh no, no.’ He was blinking convulsively, confusion writ upon his brow. ‘There’s a six-thousand-pound reward, Barnett. Six thousand pounds! I could solve five hundred cases and not earn half that amount!’

‘They’re an important family, sir,’ I said. ‘Isn’t the Duke a Knight of the Garter?’

He snorted. ‘Holmes used to be more discreet.’

‘You don’t know it was Holmes told the press.’

‘You’re right. It was no doubt Watson, trying to sell a few more books.’

There were no cabs at Catford Bridge station so we walked down past a row of almshouses towards the green. It was a frosty day, the sky low and dark over the buildings. Though it wasn’t bright, it was some relief to be out of the murky air of the city. I felt my steps grow lighter, my head clear.

Catford was an old farming village being eaten by London. There was building work going on everywhere: a tramway to Greenwich was being laid; bricklayers were putting up the walls of a bank next to the pump; foundations were being dug out for a grand new pub. Off the main street, past the small houses near the station, big villas for merchants and city workers were rising. Poorer areas were hidden here and there, in the shadows of the tram depot and the forge, where the families of farm workers lived in rickety sheds and damp basements, crammed into wretched houses with boarded windows and broken gutters.

The Plough and Harrow was just the sort of place you found outside town – a stone floor that could have done with a broom for the mud, walls panelled in dark wood, a half door that served as a counter. A glum grandma sat with a blank-faced younger fellow on the benches at one side of the fire, while three old blokes with veined cheeks and pipes in their mouths played dominoes on the other. An ancient dog with matted hair chewed a stick by their feet.

‘Any cabs around here, madam?’ the guvnor asked the landlady after we’d got a couple of pints.

‘The lad may take you in the cart if it’s local,’ she answered. She wore a cowboy hat like you see in the Buffalo Bill shows.

‘The Ockwell farm,’ said the guvnor. ‘D’you know the family, madam?’

‘Godwin’s in here often enough. Why you asking?’

‘We’ve some business with them, that’s all,’ answered the guvnor, taking a swig of his porter. He smiled at the lady. ‘I do like that hat.’

‘Why thank you, pardner.’ Her face softened; she ran her finger along the edge of the brim. ‘American fellow gave it me.’

‘Decent people, the Ockwells,’ growled one of the old men by the fire. ‘Family been here two hundred year at least, maybe more.’

‘They be straight with you long as you be straight with them,’ said another. He lifted his foot and shoved the old dog away from their table. ‘Ain’t nobody’s fools, if that’s what you’re thinking.’

The door opened and two builders, both with wild, grizzled beards, walked in. One was a big, bald fellow wearing a muddy moleskin suit with two jackets, a peaked cap topped with a knob of wool. The other was just as tall but thin, a red cloth wound around his neck, his corduroy jacket covered in rips and poorly made repairs. A shock of hair sprouted from his cap and ran into the tangle of his beard.

‘Morning, Skulky, morning, Edgar,’ said the landlady, setting out two tankards for them. Without a word, they began to drink.

‘The brothers are up Ockwell farm at the minute, fixing their well,’ she said to us. ‘Ain’t you, lads?’

‘That’s their concern, is it?’ asked the thin bloke.

‘These gentlemen was just asking about the farm, Skulky,’ she said. ‘Got some business with them.’

‘From London, are they?’ he asked.

‘South London,’ I said. ‘You know the family, do you?’

‘Perhaps you could tell him this ain’t London, Bell,’ said the bald one, scratching his beard. ‘Perhaps you could tell them folk respect each other’s privacy down here.’

The builders finished their pints and left.