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‘Arrowood is a flawed but engaging hero and the plot spins from peril to twist and back with real panache’
The Times
‘A fantastic creation’
The Spectator
‘Compelling’
Seattle Times
‘Strongly reminiscent of Robert Galbraith’s Cormoran Strike novels…a memorable detective who can stand among the best’
Harrow Times
‘Mick Finlay’s atmospheric, detailed, singular London is a terrifying place I hope to return to again and again’
Ross Armstrong
‘If you ever thought the Sherlock Holmes stories might benefit from being steeped in gin, caked in grime and then left unwashed for weeks…Mick Finlay’s 1895-set detective debut is for you’
Crime Scene
‘A book with enough warmth, charm, humour and intrigue to signal the start of an excellent new series’
Vaseem Khan
‘Readers of historical detective fiction will enjoy this well-set, darkly humorous addition to the canon’
Historical Novel Society
‘Another brilliant read from Mick Finlay … even better than [Arrowood]’
B A Paris
‘Gripping’
Daily Telegraph
‘Astounding … If you crave Victorian age murder mystery, love darkly gothic atmospheres and want your detective rather tattered and torn at the edges Arrowood is your man’
SHOTS
‘Enthralling’
Publishers Weekly
MICK FINLAY was born in Glasgow but left as a young boy, living in Canada and then England. Before becoming an academic, he ran a market stall on Portobello Road, and has worked as a tent-hand in a travelling circus, a butcher’s boy, a hotel porter, and in various jobs in the NHS and social services. He teaches in a psychology department, and has published research on political violence and persuasion, verbal and non-verbal communication, and disability. He now lives in Brighton with his family.
Arrowood and the Thames Corpses
Mick Finlay
ONE PLACE. MANY STORIES
Copyright
An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2020
Copyright © Mick Finlay 2020
Mick Finlay asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Ebook Edition © April 2020 ISBN: 9780008324537
Version 2020-03-10
Note to Readers
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Page numbers taken from the following print edition: ISBN 9780008324520
Contents
Cover
Praise
About the Author
Title Page
Copyright
Note to Readers
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, Summer, 1896
We were playing cards in the parlour when the captain and his daughter arrived. It was late morning, the flies drifting around the guvnor’s knuckle head in the midsummer heat. For the last few days we’d been waiting on a case from the lawyer Scrapes, but he kept delaying and the longer it went on the longer we weren’t earning. Arrowood was vexed: he hadn’t been sleeping too well since his sister Ettie returned from Birmingham with the baby, and he was suffering a rash under his arm. Each hour that passed worsened his temper.
‘A bit of breeze, is that too much to ask?’ he grumbled, throwing his cards on the table in frustration. As he pushed himself up, the back of his britches clung for a moment to the damp chair. He stuck a finger in his waistcoat pocket and hooked out a coin. ‘Get me a kidney pudding will you, Barnett? You won’t be hungry, I suppose. It’s only eleven.’
I got to my feet. It was an errand I’d run hundreds of times before, and I knew how it went with him. Money was tight between cases. Always was. Maybe one day it’d be easier, but I wasn’t holding any hope on it.
The guvnor’s rooms were behind the pudding shop on Coin Street. It was hot as a foundry in there, the long black range baking with all its might, pots boiling away on the top. A couple of sweaty customers stood in line waiting to get served by Albert, who seemed to be the only one in the family still working. Mrs Pudding was bent double over the counter, her face resting on a cloth. Little Albert stood wheezing on the doorstep, staring at his boots in a fug. Next to him on the pavement sat a couple of little monkeys, no more than six or seven years old, their hands out in the hope some punter might give them a bit of food.
‘Lucky you come in just now, Norman,’ said Albert in his usual glum voice. ‘These folk were just asking for Mr Arrowood.’
The captain was solid and square-faced, about forty or fifty I supposed, his eyes shaded by a battered riverboat cap. He grasped a small packet of meat in both hands. Behind him was a girl of fourteen or fifteen, her shoulders wide and strong, her face covered in freckles. A thin bonnet, its edges dark with sweat, was tied tight over her head.
‘I’m his assistant,’ I said, offering each my hand. ‘Come through.’
I led them back up the dusty corridor lined with sacks of sugar and flour and into the parlour. The guvnor looked at us in horror as we stepped through the door. A little groan came from the girl.
In the short time I’d been away he’d taken off his britches and shirt, and now sat at the table wearing nothing but his drawers and vest, a piece of bread and butter in his hand. His stumpy legs were white as lard, hairy here and bald there, and his drawers were stained in the most shameful way, the sagging lump between his legs like a clutch of baby mussels.
‘Oh, Lord,’ he muttered, grabbing his britches from the floor and trying to shove his bloated feet through. ‘Excuse me, please. I was just …’
As he fumbled with his shirt, the man and the freckled girl stood in the doorway, silent and still.
‘This is Mr Arrowood,’ I told them.
The boatman nodded, a grim look on his square face. Doing her best not to see the writhing spectacle before her, the girl’s eyes travelled over the gloomy little parlour, the flies circling in the centre of the room, the bare floor, the stacks of newspaper against the walls. By the open window was a shelf holding his books on emotions and the psychology of the mind, but her eyes lingered longest on the orange cat sat like a sentry on the mantel. The man seemed to fix on the sticky tabletop with its melting packet of butter, its ragged Allinson’s loaf, its wild scatter of crumbs.
‘I’m so very sorry, miss,’ said Arrowood, tucking in his shirt. ‘I can only hope the sight of the good Lord’s creation hasn’t caused you any spiritual distress.’
The young woman dropped her eyes and smiled.
‘Now,’ he said when all was right again. ‘Please have a seat. What did you want to see me about?’
‘Name’s Captain Moon,’ said the bloke when they were sat down at the table. He twitched his head at the girl. ‘This here’s my daughter, Suzie. We’ve a problem and hoped you could help.’
The captain pulled off his cap and wiped the sweat from his brow. His eyes were small, his jaw and mouth hid beneath a bush of orange and grey hair. His suit was too thick for such a warm July, its elbows a little over-polished.
‘We run a little pleasure steamer, sir. The Gravesend Queen. Take folk up to Gravesend every Saturday and Sunday for the pleasure gardens. Anyways, there’s a fellow been damaging the boat when she’s moored overnight. It’ll put us out of business if it keeps on. Summer’s when we make our money, see.’
‘Polgreen’s his name,’ said Suzie. ‘Ain’t it, Dad?’
Moon gave a nod.
‘What sort of damage have you suffered?’ asked the guvnor.
‘First it was rocks through the windows,’ answered Moon. ‘Next thing I turn up one morning and me lamps is all gone.’
‘The fish guts, Dad,’ said Suzie. She looked at me stood by the door, her eyes strong and hard.
‘Aye. That was the first, the windows was after.’ He jumped up from the chair, pacing over to the door, his hands in his pockets. ‘He dumped a load of old fish guts in the saloon! Disgusting it was, like the devil himself’d spewed all over the place.’
‘Where’s the boat moored, Captain?’
‘We had her just off the old pier by Victoria Bridge when it started. We moved her since.’
‘Any other boats there?’
‘Five or six, but he’s careful. Nobody’s seen anything.’ He pointed at the guvnor’s pile of books. ‘You read all that?’
‘They help me do my work. Are you interested in the psychology of the mind, Captain?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Dad went to the police but they won’t do nothing,’ said Suzie. ‘Told us to moor her somewhere else. Hide her, like. So we move her up to Bermondsey and what happens, we turn up this morning and the awning’s sliced to ribbons!’
‘We paid four quid for that awning,’ said Moon.
‘Can’t afford to get another, not right now, and the customers ain’t going to be too happy with no shelter on deck,’ said Suzie.
‘The Old Bill told us to put the deckhand on board overnight,’ Moon went on. ‘But what if they scuttle her? He’d be killed. That you, is it?’
Moon was pointing at the photographic portrait of the guvnor above the little fireplace.
‘Yes, indeed,’ said the guvnor, a contented smile coming over his face. The photographer’d told him he looked like Moses and he couldn’t help but think that maybe there was something in it. He gave the hot rash under his arm a rub.
‘Very striking,’ said Moon. ‘Very good.’
‘Thank you, Captain. Now, are you sure it’s this fellow Polgreen?’
‘We know it’s him, sir,’ said Suzie. She sat forward, her arms on the table. ‘He’s the only one runs a steamer on our route to Gravesend. Takes the day-trippers, same as us. He’s trying to drive us out, ain’t he, Dad?’
Her old man nodded.
‘But you’re not so sure, Captain?’ asked the guvnor.
‘No. Yes. Yes, I am sure.’ He nodded. ‘I am sure.’
‘We been running up there since more ’n thirteen, fourteen year,’ said Suzie. ‘Tell him, Dad.’
‘Used to be quite a few boats on the route afore they built the railway out that far. We was the last one left and what happens this time last year? Only this blooming foreigner Polgreen comes along with an old bucket of a boat and starts taking passengers. Same piers, same route.’
‘Which piers d’you use?’ asked the guvnor.
‘We pick up at Old Swan Pier by London Bridge and take them to Terrace Pier in Gravesend.’
‘You don’t use the pier at Rosherville?’
‘Too dear, Mr Arrowood. The customers don’t mind walking to the pleasure gardens if it saves them a few coins. I told Polgreen Gravesend can’t support two boats, but he won’t listen.’
‘So now we’re taking half the money we took before,’ cried Suzie, her face red with it all. ‘We can’t hardly get by, but those foreigners seem to live on half what we need.’
‘Eat rats, I heard,’ declared the Captain. ‘Live on the boat too, like bargees.’
‘He’s trying to make it that bad for us we pack it in.’
‘Have you actually seen Polgreen damaging your boat?’ asked the guvnor.
‘We ain’t seen him, but it’s him all right,’ answered Suzie. ‘Ain’t it, Dad?’
Moon nodded.
‘Who else works on your boat?’ asked Arrowood.
‘Only Belasco, the deckhand,’ said Moon.
‘D’you trust him?’
‘He’d never harm the boat. Been with us since the start.’
Just then, the guvnor’s sister Ettie called out from the bedroom upstairs. ‘William! I need some help!’
Arrowood winced. ‘Carry on, sir,’ he said, rubbing his forehead. ‘What else can you tell us?’
‘I ain’t so sure Polgreen’s a captain neither,’ said Moon. ‘Don’t seem to know the rules of the water.’
Now the baby started to cry. A moment later we heard the door at the top of the stairs creak open, and Ettie’s feet coming down the steps.
‘Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize,’ she said, startled to see the Captain and his daughter there. She looked worn out, her face pale, her hair loose and falling over her shoulders. There were baby stains on her blouse. She wasn’t used to caring for a child, wasn’t the sort of woman who could be contained inside a little place like this for long, and it was getting to her.
‘I’m in a consultation,’ said the guvnor.
She shot me a tired smile, then nodded at our two guests.
‘I won’t disturb you.’ She looked at the guvnor. ‘The curtain’s come down again, William,’ she said, turning to climb the narrow staircase at the back of the parlour. ‘The child won’t settle.’
The guvnor raised his eyes to the ceiling, muttering to himself as the crying continued. There was only one bedroom up there, and Arrowood shared it with his sister. He pushed himself to his feet with a groan and waddled over to the mantel, where he collected his pipe. He smiled at Moon. ‘Please, sir, continue.’
‘When he turned up, his boat was Barley Belle,’ said Moon. ‘Then, a week after he starts taking our custom, he goes and names his boat the same as ours. Rosherville Queen she was then. I tried to get him to change it. The Company of Watermen tried, and the Conservancy officials, but he wouldn’t do it so we had to change our name! Didn’t want the punters confusing his old bucket with ours, did we? Our boat, what’d been there first! That’s how she became the Gravesend Queen.’
The guvnor shook his head as he lit his pipe. ‘The fellow sounds difficult. He’s determined.’
Moon sighed. ‘It has wore me out, Mr Arrowood. I own it.’
‘Have you considered changing your destination? Hampton Court or Southend or somewhere?’
‘But it’s our route.’
‘All those other routes got bigger boats than ours,’ said Suzie. ‘With food and music and such. We can’t take them on. Gravesend’s the only place we can go with a little old boat like ours. The punters who still like Rosherville Gardens ain’t too choosey, and that’s the truth of it, sir.’
‘I’m sorry for you,’ said the guvnor, shaking his great ox’s head. ‘This isn’t right. Tell me, how did you hear of us? Was it the Catford Inquiry?’
‘The salt thieves,’ answered Moon. ‘That’s what we heard about.’
‘Salt thieves?’
‘From the barges,’ said Moon. ‘Deptford, was it?’
The guvnor looked at me, a puzzle in his eyes.
‘That’s not one of our cases,’ I said.
‘Perhaps you read of the Fenian case?’ asked the guvnor.
‘Sorry, sir,’ said Moon, shaking his head. ‘I ain’t a reader.’
‘The gas pipe affair?’
‘You never caught the salt thieves?’ asked Moon.
‘No. You’re not confusing me with Sherlock Holmes, are you?’ asked the guvnor.
‘Well, now I ain’t sure about those cases, Mr Arrowood, but I can’t see anyone confusing you with him.’
‘Can we help him, sir?’ I asked, seeing the guvnor starting to lose his good temper. He always thought we should be known more than we were, and it upset him to find almost nobody’d ever heard of us. The only private enquiry agent the papers ever seemed to cover was Sherlock Holmes, and just reading about the fellow’s cases upset the guvnor worse than sour beer. Arrowood was an emotional fellow, and it was one of my jobs to keep him on the level. That and a bit of strong-arm business from time to time.
Upstairs, the baby’s crying got quieter, till it was only a whimper. Arrowood glanced up at the ceiling and sighed.
‘I’d like to do something for you, Captain,’ he said. ‘But I’m afraid we’re about to start on an important case with a lawyer. I’m not sure we’ve enough time to do yours justice.’
Moon looked at the guvnor like he didn’t understand.
‘Why didn’t you tell us that at the start?’ asked Suzie, her eyes lit up. ‘Is it because we never heard of your cases?’
‘Of course not. I didn’t know how long yours would take until you explained it.’
‘But can’t you do anything?’
The guvnor thought for a moment, his fingers tapping away at the table. Through the open window we could hear the hens in the yard next door.
‘We can go and have a talk with this Polgreen,’ he said at last. ‘Mr Barnett’s rather good at persuading people to stop doing things, as you might guess from his appearance.’
‘Well, he’s big enough,’ said Moon, looking at me.
‘He’s more than that, Captain. He’s an expert negotiator.’ The guvnor winced as the wailing started again upstairs.
‘We’ll warn him off,’ I said. ‘You’re sure it’s him though, are you?’
‘We told you,’ said Suzie. ‘It’s him.’
The guvnor gave me the nod and rose from the chair. ‘I must attend to my sister, Captain,’ he said. ‘Mr Barnett will deal with the arrangements. We’ll visit Polgreen and call on you later this evening.’
He waddled over to the stairs and took himself up to face the fallen curtain.
‘Ten shillings for half a day’s work,’ I said. ‘In advance.’
The captain flitched when he heard the price, but he fished in his pocket and pulled out a purse. When the money was handed over, I took down his address and the mooring of Polgreen’s boat. It all seemed pretty straightforward. Little did I know that I’d soon come to wish I’d never met Captain Moon, nor ever heard of the Gravesend Queen.
Chapter Two
After lunch, we took the train to Queenstown then walked across Battersea Park to Ransome’s Dock. It was a long, deep creek, with a wide basin at the end, a foundry on one side and an ice warehouse on the other. A bloke hoiking bales of hay from a barge pointed us past a row of lighters to where Polgreen’s boat was moored, a small paddle steamer, old but well kept. The funnel and paddle boxes were yellow and black, the awning bright and stripy. A saloon with windows along its length took up half the boat, with a wheelhouse at the front and a sundeck on its roof. A boy with a bare brown back stood up there polishing the brass.
‘Captain Polgreen around, lad?’ asked the guvnor.
‘In the saloon, sir.’
A woman of middle age rose from the deck behind him, a scrubbing brush in her hand. Her face was dark as a Hindoo, and she watched us close as we climbed aboard and made our way along to the door. Inside we found an older bloke fiddling around under the drinks counter. He stood when he heard us, a heavy wrench in his hand. He was a strong fellow, a bit battered, an ugly burn running the length of one arm. Like the lad, he wore no shirt.
‘What can I do for you, gentlemen?’ he asked, coming out from behind the counter.
There was a heavy accent in his voice, Cornish or something I supposed. He had the same thick black hair as his son, his brow low down his sun-tanned face. He breathed heavy.
‘Captain Moon’s engaged us to discover who’s been damaging his boat,’ said the guvnor. I watched Polgreen real careful as he talked. ‘He says it’s you.’
‘Oh, that’s the game, is it? And who may you be?’ He had the look of a smuggler about him, with mean, darting eyes, his whiskers stiff and tight like black gorse. Tattoos ran up and down his arms, most of them smudged and stretched out of shape.
‘Mr Arrowood. This is Mr Barnett. We’re private enquiry agents. So, was it you?’
‘Well, he thinks it was. Accused me of it in front of my customers as well. Bloody wild, he were. Shouting at me. Cursing me. Shouldn’t be in charge of a boat, that bloke. Need a calm head to steer a steamer on a river as busy at this one, and Moon ain’t got one.’
The guvnor smiled and cocked his head. He laughed.
Polgreen’s face fell. ‘What’s funny?’
The guvnor laughed some more. I did too, just like he’d taught me. Polgreen scowled. Finally, the guvnor leant in to him and whispered: ‘You didn’t answer my question. Did you damage his boat, Captain?’
‘I didn’t touch his blooming boat.’
‘Did you arrange for someone else to damage it?’
‘No. And I don’t suppose he told you he threw all my lifebuoys in the current? And the cushions off my benches?’ Polgreen looked from the guvnor to me. His knuckles were white as he gripped the wrench. ‘No? Well, he did. In Gravesend, it were. He waited till I’d gone off for my lunch and he shoved my lad out the way and threw them all in the water. That’s two quid, more or less. Two quid! I got the police onto him. They took him up before the beak. Got fined ten bob for it and had to pay me back.’