Free Fatal Enquiry by Will Thomas Page A

already eaten a wonderful supper prepared by Etienne Dummolard, our cook, enjoyed a hot soak in the bathhouse, and would currently be reading or going out with my friend Israel Zangwill to a concert or coffeehouse. Now my life was in ruins. Why bother wasting time and effort climbing out of the muck if you’re fated to be tossed back in again?
    At one point, I was stopped by a constable who asked me if I’d seen anything unusual or anyone hiding along the waterfront. I told him that with all the activity along the river that evening, it didn’t seem possible for anyone to escape being found. I was even so bold as to ask if the rumor of a reward was true. He responded that he doubted it, and in any case, it wouldn’t be going into the pocket of his tunic, anyway. I lit a cigarette for him, wondering what the commissioner or Inspector Abberline would say to this officer casually chatting up one of the suspects they were presently hunting all over London.
    Not long after, I nearly stumbled over Barker. He was sitting on the edge of a dock with his feet dangling over the water, and his candle had guttered and gone out. By then the moon had risen and we were bathed in a cool blue light. I put down my lantern and shook out my arm, for it had been a chore to carry it all that distance. I was tired and hungry and despondent about our predicament.
    “Why have we stopped?” I demanded, though it felt good to rest for a moment and stretch my aching limbs.
    In response, Barker looked over his shoulder. I turned my head and barely discerned a pair of heavy boots in the moonlight, the man inside them obscured by the shadow of an outbuilding.
    “Who’s there?” I asked, half to Barker and half to whoever had stopped him.
    A man I had never seen before stepped forward into the moonlight. He was massive, over eighteen stone, and taller than Barker, with the misshapen nose of a boxer, and ears that were mere lumps on the side of his head. He had very large black side whiskers and looked capable of thrashing even Cyrus Barker.
    “James Briggs,” my employer said.
    “Not ‘Bully Boy’ Briggs?” I asked. The latter had been one of the Guv’s associates. Barker had occasionally recommended Briggs as a bodyguard to clients.
    “Sorry, Barker.” The huge man spoke at last, taking off an enormous bowler hat that still managed to look too small for his large head. “I’ve fallen on hard times. I know we been friends for years, but I could really use that reward.”
    Barker reached for a piling and pulled himself up. “It was very shrewd of you to work out where I was going, James.”
    “You always was a water man, Cyrus. It’s the sea captain in you. It weren’t that hard to figure out where you might go.”
    “Perhaps not,” Barker conceded, “but I don’t intend to make things easy for you.”
    The man’s face creased into a grin. “Wouldn’t have it any other way. Haven’t had me a proper scrap in two years or more.”
    “But you’re hardly unarmed. I assume the priest is with you?”
    “Aye, his holiness is by my side as always.” Briggs shook his arm and something slid out of his sleeve, a lethal-looking metal club with a bulbous knob at one end and a leather thong at the other. Though a priest is used to club salmon in fishing, Briggs had converted his to become a clubber of men. He went into a crouch and moved toward the Guv.
    “Toss me a weapon, lad,” Barker ordered. “Look behind you.”
    I reached for the first thing that came to hand, a boat hook about six feet long, sticking out of a beached dinghy, and tossed it to my employer.
    “That don’t seem quite fair, Cyrus. It’s too long,” Briggs complained.
    “You never used to be so particular, Jimmy. There’s an oar behind you. It’s your choice.”
    Briggs hefted the oar as if testing it, and then without warning, swung it at my employer’s head. The Guv ducked backward out of reach, avoiding it so narrowly I would swear it rustled his newly