The Particular Problem of Postern Prison
Chapter Ten
"This really is intolerable."
Dr Martin was aggrieved, with good reason. We had interrupted his surgery, caused the death – in his eyes at least – of one of his patients and then had had the temerity to bind him hand and foot. He had cause for complaint, but he would have been better advised to keep it to himself. None of us were in the mood to bandy words him, and the atmosphere was fraught.
There were eight of us, including the egregious Dr Martin, along with his fellow hostages, Inspector Lestrade and Prison Warder Formby. The ninth member of this unhappy gathering lay in the farthermost corner of the room beneath a sheet stained with the irregular marks left by his blood, now drying to various shades of rust. The hills and valleys of the covering loosely defined the shape of a man, the late Arthur Tippet. He had died as he had lived, easing into eternity without ceremony or leaving many to mourn him.
Yet I had cause to remember. I still had his blood on my sleeves and the memory of his weight in my arms. Holding a man at that moment when his life departs is a strange experience. This mass of bone and muscle and blood and sinew of which we are all so proud is as susceptible to decay and fault as many of our modern day machines. A cog breaks, a piston seizes, the oil runs away, and we die.
We are as fragile as a butterfly – and just as easily destroyed.
It had taken two bullets to end Arthur Tippet's meagre life. There would be more, one at least for each of us should we follow his example and dare to step outside this safe haven. After the shock of the death, we had piled the furniture against the door and barricaded ourselves in. Merridew had staked his position, and we ours. Stalemate, as far as Regan was concerned, a situation that our new companions were eager to change.
Pepper and Reeks by name, thugs for hire by profession, they had been transferred to Postern after an outbreak of gaol fever at their last prison had seen twelve other inmates perish. The healthy had been moved out, while the ill and any who had associated with them had been left behind, either to live or die as they chose. Two centuries before, the fear of plague had caused people to act much the same: the infected confined to their houses, the door barred and painted with a red cross, and then the wait to see who, if any, emerged after the period of quarantine was over. Things had not changed much. Plus ça change, plus c'est la meme chose, as the saying goes.
My initial concern that they might be harbouring infection and had been passed as fit by a doctor as disinterested as Dr Martin was somewhat dispelled by their apparent zeal for the task in hand. They appeared hale and hearty enough, rather too much for my liking, for they exuded a feral menace that made me uneasy. These were men hardened to the ways of prison life and ready to support any cause that might further their interests. Despite being newcomers to Postern, they were working hard to consolidate their position, especially so Pepper, the smaller of the two and very much the leader.
As a result, I found myself losing ground in the battle for Regan's trust. I was the sole source of reason amidst a boiling ferment of impotent rage. Mosteyn Jones was no help; he had found himself a corner out of everyone's way and had stayed there, not daring to look in my direction. I, like the doctor, had good cause to be aggrieved, considering the beating he had cost me. Without his support, he would cost me a great deal more. If Regan turned from me and took the course Pepper and Reeks were suggesting, none of us would leave this room alive.
Not that any of this appeared to have occurred to Dr Martin. He apparently considered his best course of action lay in airing his grievances and emphasising the hopelessness of the situation – remarks which were tantamount to provocation. And it was only a matter of time before they hit their mark.
"This has nothing to do with me," said he peremptorily. "I demand that you let me go this instant."
"You're in no position to be demanding anything, Doc," Pepper retorted. "You've heard what Regan here wants. As soon as he gets it, then we'll let you go."
"I can't wait that long. I have an appointment at my club at five."
Pepper chuckled nastily. "Looks like you'll be missing it. Unless of course the Governor decides to be reasonable before then."
"Mr Merridew won't negotiate with you," said the doctor, with an air of misplaced confidence. "I don't know why you don't give yourselves up now and put an end to this nonsense. You're wasting everybody's time."
"We've got nowhere particular we have to be, do we, Reeks?" The pair exchanged glances and laughed. "I don't mind wasting time in a good cause."
"Good cause," Martin sneered. "It's always the same with you people, an excuse for everything, always trying to get out of paying your dues to society. If you're not ill, you're pleading family troubles. I don't believe a word of it about your daughter, Regan. I think—"
"And I think you've said enough," Lestrade interrupted him.
Martin looked at him down the length of his nose. "You don't seriously agree with what these miscreants are doing?"
"Not with their methods, no. As far as Regan is concerned, it seems to me that a little compassion on Governor Merridew's part wouldn't go amiss."
"This is a prison, Mr Lestrade, not a Sunday school. We can't allow prisoners to take outings whenever they feel like it. Good heavens, if you are representative of your profession, then no wonder the country is sliding into a state of anarchy." His gaze switched to Regan. "This has gone quite far enough. Release me now."
"No one's going anywhere until I get to see my daughter," he grunted, wiping the back of his free hand across his glistening brow. "That's all I want. To see my little girl."
The room was chill and unheated, yet Regan was presenting a ready sweat and a hectic flush on his cheeks. He was tired, certainly. The need to stay alert to fend off Pepper and Reeks relentless verbal attacks were exhausting for me too. But there was something about his manner, as though the effort of the past few hours had drained his energy, and a sallow colour about his skin and a stiffness to his movements that made me wonder if he had been telling the truth when he had told the warders he was ill in order to be taken to the infirmary.
If Regan was ailing, whatever the cause, then it was only a matter of time before that formidable strength of his failed him. When that happened, I was not entirely confident of my ability to defeat Pepper and Reeks in claiming the weapon and bringing this uneasy charade to an end. Pepper wanted violence; indeed, I sensed that he thrived on the very thought of it. To what end, I could not perceive. In harming or killing the hostages, he would in effect be signing all our death warrants. Yet he seemed too sly and cunning to throw his life away in a vainglorious gesture for another man's cause, however just.
Pepper had a purpose in mind, and I was at a loss as to what it was.
What I did know was that he presented a threat. He was a powder keg waiting for a spark before unleashing hell. My concern was that Dr Martin was happy to provide it for him.
"For heaven's sake," he railed, "you must see that Merridew will never agree to your demands."
"He will," said Regan, his voice still edged with steely intent, if a little less firm that it had been before.
"If you believe that, then you're a fool."
Insulting a man who held the only weapon in the room was not perhaps advisable. With Regan slow to react, it fell to Pepper, who leapt upon the chance and hurried to his defence.
"Fool is he, Doc? Then how comes he's the one with the bottle and you're sitting there trussed up like the Christmas goose waiting for the butcher to wring your neck."
To give him credit, Martin was not without pluck. He looked his wiry adversary up and down with an ill-disguised disdain.
"Don't threaten me," said he. "You wouldn't dare lay a finger on me."
"Oh, wouldn't I?" Pepper brought his face close to Martin's and stared him straight in the eye. "You know what me and Reeks got sent down for? There was this fella what owed money, see, and when it came time to pay it back, he didn't want to. So what we had to do was to persuade him, and when he still wouldn't see sense, well, we had no choice, did we?"
"I can't say I'm surprised."
"No, but he was. He thought he was only in for a kicking, but we had to teach him a lesson pour encouragering les others, as the French say. Let's just say he won't be siring any more children in a hurry." He smiled grimly, revealing twisted teeth set in blackened gums, and straightened the doctor's collar with almost reverential care. "What about you, Doc? You got any plans on becoming a father?"
Martin swallowed hard. "You wouldn't dare."
This time there was less conviction in his voice, and Pepper seized upon it.
"Don't dare me, Doc. There's a host of armed men out there waiting to shoot us down like they did that other poor cove. Tell me, what have any of us got gain by letting you live?"
I believed him, and from Martin's expression, I saw that he did too. Wisely, he said no more, and it fell to Regan to re-impose order.
"That's enough," said he. "We've no need for violence."
Having possession of the only weapon in the room gave him that right. Given half a chance, Pepper and Reeks were ready to rob him of that advantage, like a pair of wolves hunting down a weakening deer. For now, they were content bide their time. That did not stop them from trying to hasten the end.
"See sense, man!" cried Pepper. "You'll not be getting what you want while we're forced to sit in here cooling our heels. Merridew thinks he's got the upper hand. You've got to show him that he's wrong."
"He's right," agreed Reeks. "You'll never get to see that little girl of yours if you don't."
"Now I appreciate that you're a man whom Mother Nature did not bless with what I call an h'aptitude for violence." His sly eyes glinted with an almost pained longing as his gaze fell on the bottle in Regan's hand. "I respect your principles, truly I do. However, you've got to understand that unless you show your hand, Merridew won't do a thing you say. And how's that going to help your little Emily, eh?"
Every mention of his daughter made Regan's resolve weaken all the more. Sensing this, Pepper reached tentatively for the bottle.
"Why don't you let me have that?" said he. "I'll do what needs to be done. Merridew'll be reasonable then."
His fingers were twitching towards it when I intervened. "No, Regan, you can't do it."
Regan cast doubtful eyes in my direction.
"If you kill them," I persisted, "what protection do we have?"
"Who said anything about killing them?" said Pepper, turning to face me with a challenging look. "You do want to help Regan here, don't you, Holmes?"
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Reeks take a step or two in my direction to take up position at my back.
I held my ground. "Of course I do."
"Good. Then all I'm saying is that we lop a bit off these prisoners of ours. A finger here, an ear there – that'll get Merridew's attention."
"No. I won't be party to barbarity."
"Is that what you call it?" His voice had dropped several notes and his beady eyes held a hard gleam of spite. "You think they gave that any thought when they rearranged that pretty face of yours? Or am I wrong?" His lips twisted into a sneer. "Did the other prisoners think you deserved it? You've got the look of a chirper to me." [1]
"Leave him alone," muttered Regan. "Holmes is all right."
"Do you know that for certain?" said Pepper. "Seems to me he's rather more concerned about what happens to the Doc here and this detective inspector. I wouldn't be surprised if he was working for them turnkeys. You said he had a nice cosy cell all to himself, Regan, and he was allowed visitors. Why him and not you, eh? What has he done to deserve special favours in this jug? Ever asked yourself that?" [2]
If this was a change of tactics, it was a subtle one. Pepper had recognised that I possessed a fragile element of influence over Regan and was working on a means of destroying it. With me, the de facto voice of his conscience gone, his resolution not to harm his prisoners would not last forever. Whatever respect he had for Inspector Lestrade would not survive the combined buffeting of Pepper and Reeks' arguments about his fading chances of seeing his daughter. In order to press their case, I would have to be discredited or removed. Pepper had obviously opted for the former; whether he would move to the latter when the field was his remained to be seen.
On any other day, this transparent ruse of his may have been successful. Regan did not trust lightly, and while to some extent I had earned my position in this tenuous alliance, it helped my cause that there was another scapegoat to hand.
"Holmes is no friend of the turnkeys," said Regan, laughing mirthlessly. "That's what he got through trying to escape, no thanks to Jones here. He nosed on him to get himself moved out of here. I won't trust the treacherous little sod as far as I could throw him."
At the mention of his name, Mosteyn Jones looked up and shrank further into his corner.
"Did he now?" said Pepper, grinning maliciously.
With a new target in his sights, he lost interest in me, and with a nod to his accomplice, they closed in on the unfortunate Jones. From the way Reeks cracked his knuckles and bunched his fists, I gathered that violence was about to take place. Given our past history, I had no particular reason to prevent what was about to happen; Jones must have known that this would be his reward for betraying a fellow inmate and it had been this certainty of reprisals from the other prisoners that had brought about his segregation after the night my bid for freedom had been foiled.
Every instinct told me that to take his side now would be to weaken my own position. Yet before ere the first punch fell, I found myself defending him. Jones may have deserved a beating, but not death. Pepper and Reeks were too eager to mete out their own brand of justice and I doubted they had any intention of stopping when that old requirement of 'a tooth for a tooth' had been met. That nagging intuition of mine reminded me that I was still undecided as to Pepper's motives. The evident relish he took in hauling Jones to his feet and pinioning his arms behind him told me that this was not for my benefit, but for personal reasons, some far less noble.
"Leave him," I spoke up. "I don't blame him for what happened."
"He noses on you and you say you don't blame him?" Pepper chuckled. "That kicking they gave you shake your brains loose or something, Holmes?"
Jones dared to meet my gaze and in that moment I saw there stark fear. This was not simply craven cowardice, it was based on knowledge. He knew; more than that, he was certain of his fate and it terrified him.
Why he should have been confident of his death when he might reasonably have expected a beating perplexed me. I credited him with intelligence, but not enough to have perceived what lay behind Pepper's readiness to act as judge, jury and executioner in his case. If I had been inclined to save him before, it was paramount that I did so know, if only to prise from him what he knew of this pair of thugs.
"Look at his face." I turned Jones' bruised eye and cut lip to work in his favour. "Webb beat it out of him."
"Wouldn't be the first time," Regan grunted. "Doesn't make what he did right."
"Webb can be very persuasive," I said, my hand straying meaningfully to my tender cheekbone. "Especially if you're a snivelling coward like Jones here."
"Well, you're a more forgiving man than me, Holmes. You sure you don't want him roughed up? You'd be well within your rights."
"I'll see to Jones in my own time," I said, meeting Pepper's simmering stare. "Besides, now's not the time or the place. Merridew wants us fighting between ourselves. You never heard of divide and conquer, Pepper?"
Regan nodded. "Holmes is right. Let him go. We might have need of him."
Reluctantly Pepper relinquished his hold on his victim. Jones scuttled out of his grasp and away into the adjoining room. I followed, caught up with him and for the benefit of the curious, grabbed him by his lapels and thumped him up against the wall.
"I'm sorry, Holmes," he gabbled. "I didn't mean to—"
"Yes, you did. That's not what concerns me. Who are they?"
The bulge of his Adam's apple quivered beneath the glistening skin of his throat. "They're called Sticks and Stones."
"As in 'break your bones'."
Jones nodded. "They've here for me."
"Why?"
"You remember I told you about that painting I did, the copy of 'The Fighting Temeraire'? The man I painted it for, he sent them… to kill me!"
As if Mr Holmes didn't have enough to worry about!
Continued in Chapter Eleven!
[1] Informer. To 'chirp' or to 'nose' were 19th century slang expressions for 'informing'.
[2] 'Jug' – again, a slang expression, meaning 'prison'.