The Adventure of the Deverill Diamonds

Moments later I was once again sitting in P.C. Ned Burdon’s front room, a fire in the grate, as I shivered, drenched in water.

Ned had opened the door tentatively, concerned as to who might be calling on him at this hour of the night. Realising it was me, he had welcomed me in with open arms, found a blanket to wrap me in and sat me in front of the fire.

“Your arm is better,” I shivered.

“You what?” said Ned, looking confused.

“You hurt it bashing in the door, remember? You held it very straight by your side. I was worried you had broken it!”

“No. It’s fine. Thanks,” he said rubbing his left arm.

I looked around the room, supping a hot cup of tea, taking in the changes in my surroundings. The woodwork Ned had been working on was obviously complete as his tools were not on the table anymore and no shavings of sawdust were scattered there either. The bizarrely pink newspaper had disappeared too. I realised that I had never asked Sam what this pink paper was! I would make sure I asked him as soon as I saw him!

In the corner of the room I spied a small suitcase. Tied to the handle of the suitcase was a small label with the curious word “Zeebrugge” written on it. What this seemingly random assortment of consonants and vowels meant I had absolutely no idea.

Sat in the chair opposite me, Ned saw the direction of my gaze and interrupted my thoughts by saying:

“Me and the missus are goin’ away for a bit. Thought it might be good for ’er to get away from this place and all its memories.”

“That sounds like a splendid idea,” I said through chattering teeth. Hence all the tools and the newspaper being cleaned away somewhere!

“She ’ad a windfall. One of ’er old relations died. Left ’er some money. Not much but enough for us to get away for a while. We catch the boat train tomorrow night, 8 o’clock from Victoria, down to Dover, then on from there.”

“Lovely.”

“She can’t wait,” he said, stretching out his legs before the fire.

As he did so I looked at the soles of his shoes and noticed that they had been resoled. So it was Ned’s shoes that Sam had been talking about! He had noted that they had been resoled more than once and told me so after we had been ejected from Mr Deverill’s room. Knowing that it was Ned that Sam had been referring to made little difference sadly. It only added to the feeling that Sam just liked saying things and making them sound important. I mean what possible relevance could be gained from the fact that Ned’s shoes had been resoled? What in the name of Bonaparte’s backside did that have to do with anything?

“So Esther,” began Ned, “you gonna tell me what the ‘ell is goin’ on? Why you soaking wet in the middle of the night? Why you dressed in boy’s clothin’? No lies this time.”

I took a deep breath and began.

“You were right about Leland Deverill. Not about the theft of the diamonds but that he’s a criminal. He’s a smuggler. He’s been smuggling opium into the country aboard his ship - the Aurora - for the Red Razor Gang.”

Ned looked taken aback by this information. It was obviously news to him.

“ ’Ow d’you know that?”

“I was there tonight. At the docks. He met up with Eddie Holloway and the gang at midnight to hand over the opium. I was captured by them, Leland was going to kill me, but I stabbed him in the side, ran for it and jumped into the Thames!”

It was only as I was saying this that I realised how fantastical it all sounded. Ned, to his credit, did a good job of hiding his disbelief.

“You escaped the Red Razor Gang?”

“For now. But I told them my name. They might find me. Find my home.”

“I’ll tell Inspector Wakefield what you’ve just told me Esther. If what you say is true then Holloway could soon be makin’ ‘is way back to prison. And Leland a drug smuggler eh? Blimey… But what was you doin’ there in the first place Esther? What you up to?”

It was clear that he did not really believe that my life might be under threat from the gang and just wanted to know why I was out and about this late at night.

It was time to come clean. Ned had looked after me and taken pity on me twice. He was obviously a friend and could be trusted.

“Sam Wiggins and I, (Sam’s the boy you saw the other day), we’re investigating the attack on Mr Deverill and the theft of his diamonds. I’ve talked to Mr Deverill himself, but his memory is completely gone ; we’ve followed Hettie Deverill but she seems completely innocent to me ; we’ve talked to Leland Deverill but he was rude to us. I went to his meeting tonight and met Eddie Holloway and his gang. That’s how I know about the opium. But we’ve also found some other things. A hammer and a chisel under the little window outside Mr Deverill’s rooms. Sam thinks they’re important but I don’t see how…”

He stood suddenly and I stopped talking. He was cross. I could see that. Cross that we had taken the law into our own hands. To him, a trained policeman, the thought of two children investigating a dangerous crime was obviously the height of stupidity.

He gazed down at me, a tinge of anger in his eyes, and said:

“Esther. You shouldn’t be involved in this.”

“I know, Ned, but…”

“Don’t speak. You’ve said enough.”

He started to advance on me.I was certain that, at any minute, he would grab me and throw me out of his house.

As he was nearly upon me the door to the room suddenly burst open and there stood a disheveled woman with a purple hat askew on her head and her clothes awry. She had mousy-brown hair which was raggedy and lopsided. She tottered on the balls of her feet and was clearly the worse for wear for drink. She reminded me very much of Mrs Gamp (Dickens (it has, to be fair, been quite some time)) with her bulbous, red nose.

“ ’Ello, Neddy!” she cackled.

Ned immediately froze in his advance and turned to face this peculiar woman, anger still blazing in his eyes.

“Sally! I thought you was out!”

“Well I’m back Neddy, ain’t I? And I need some dosh!”

She staggered towards him, her arms outstretched as if she expected a hug. Ned Burdon kept his arms by his sides. This, then, was his drunken wife. ‘Poor woman’ I thought. ‘Addicted to a terrible substance and such a physical wreck that even her husband does not want to embrace her.’

“Let’s get you some money, Sally,” said Ned Burdon, turning an embarrassed half-smile to me, putting an arm around his poor wife and starting to walk her to the door, adding “You stay here, Esther.”

I felt so embarrassed for both of them that I had no desire to stay and be a witness to their domestic complications.

“No, it’s quite alright,” I said, rising and unwrapping the blanket from around me, “I had better be getting home.”

“No, Esther. You can stay,” insisted Ned.

“ ’Oo the ’ell is this?” exclaimed Mrs Burdon, turning her bleary eyes on me with suspicion in them.

“It don’t matter, Sally.”

“ ’Oo are ya, girl?”

“I’m Esther, miss and I am just leaving. Thank you.”

I walked past them to the door.

“Esther, stay!” cried Ned.

“No, I had better be getting home.”

“Well, walk safely then. All the way straight ’ome. And get yourselves in some better clothes. That pretty dress you was wearing when you come last time’d suit you better!”

I bolted for the door, leaving them both behind me to play out their recurring tragedy.

I was out in the night air again and the freezing cold wind bit into me, making my still wet clothes cling to me as icicles cling to the tiled rooftops.

I stood stock still on the pavement for a good five minutes contemplating what to do and where to go. I knew I was not going ‘home’ to my Father’s house, but I was not at all sure about going back to Sam’s house either. What if he were to discover me sneaking back in, in his soaking wet clothes ? He would know I had betrayed him and acted alone. But, as the frozen air stabbed me with icy blasts I knew I had no real choice.

I made my way back to Sam’s house, peeping around every corner before I went around it, looking behind me at every turn, always on the lookout for any sign of the vile Eddie Holloway and the Red Razor Gang. I was still shaken from my run-in with them and felt their evil presence everywhere I went, although I knew there was no way they could know where I was going. Still the last words of Eddie Holloway rang around my head, filling me with terror - “You ain’t seen the last of me, girly!” I sincerely hoped he was wrong. I never wanted to see him again as long as I lived.

As I walked I made a list in my head of all the suspects:

1) Eugene Deverill - ruled out. His memory was truly lost. He was not pretending to have been attacked for insurance purposes.

2) Leland Deverill - Needed money, but seemed to be getting it from opium smuggling. However, perhaps his uncle had found out about his criminal activities and was going to tell the police? Could that be the reason why Leland attacked him? Perhaps taking the diamonds was just an added bonus?

3) Kakana - acting on Leland’s orders. Or perhaps Leland told Kakana that his uncle was rich and had diamonds in his safe? Perhaps Kakana acted alone and now had the diamonds? But then how did he get them out of the safe?

4) Hettie Deverill - I had to start contemplating her as a real suspect. Loath as I was to admit it, Sam was right to suspect her. She had a motive for the crime - getting her son out of his current horrid employment and she had a way in and out of the room - her son James. Her bewitching eyes and perfectly-framed face still haunted my dreams, but Sam was right to make me look at her in a different light.

To my mental list of suspects I added another name :

5) Eddie Holloway. A known, violent criminal. His eyes had glistened at the mere thought of owning some diamonds. Perhaps Leland had told Holloway or another one of the gang about the diamonds his uncle possessed? Perhaps Holloway had them and had simply pretended to me that he knew nothing about them?

But then Sam’s recurring question came again and again into my mind. “Why make it look impossible?” If any of these people were responsible they could have either walked or broken into the room through the door, forced the old man to open the safe, coshed him and then fled with the diamonds!

The only reasons why anyone would want to make the crime look impossible that I could think of were:

1) to avert suspicion from themselves

and

2) to buy time. But time for what? Time to do what?

I arrived back at Sam’s house and my heart sank. Candles were lit in the front room and I could see the figure of Mrs Wiggins pacing up and down in the room where I had been sleeping. My leaving had been noted, despite the fact that it was now nearly 2 o’clock… With trepidation I walked to the front door and opened it.

The moment I was inside Mrs Wiggins ran towards me and threw her arms around me, clutching me to her.

“My Gawd! You’re safe!” she heaved. “I’d come downstairs to check you was asleep and snug and you’d gawn!”

“I am so sorry, Mrs Wiggins. I was an idiot! Where’s Sam?”

“Gawn out lookin’ for you ain’t ’e? As soon as I found you weren’t ’ere I run upstairs and woke ’im up. ’E jumped outta bed like it was on fire and ran out the door in search of ya!”

“Oh no… I’m so sorry…” I repeated.

“My goodness, Esther! You’re soakin’ wet! And…. are those Sammy’s clothes?”

I nodded, ashamed of stealing clothes from her.

“Well, that ain’t no good is it? I’ve got some spares upstairs. We need to get you dry and into them!”

“But…” I protested.

“No ‘buts’! Upstairs you come!”

Minutes later I was dry again and in some more of Mrs Wiggins’ clothes. Her wardrobe was so spartan that I was fairly sure I was now wearing her only other clothes. Knowing this made me feel even more dreadful.

I tried to tell Mrs Wiggins what had happened and why I had skulked out in the night, but she waved her hand to stop me and told me it could wait. She did not ask questions. Her mother’s eyes saw that I had had a terrible night and she took pity on me, showing me affection rather than suspicion.

She tucked me into the bed, promising she would wake me when Sam returned. The full fatigue of the nights’ experience overtook me and within what felt like seconds, my eyes sank shut and I was fast asleep.

You ain’t seen the last of me, girly…

Eddie Holloway! He had found me! His face sneered down at me and there was a gunshot! I screamed at the top of my lungs!

Then, as I looked around, my heart beating fast and my breath shooting out of me in sharp bursts, I realised that the noise was not a gunshot, but a door. A door that had been slammed. I was in the Wiggins’ front room still. Safe and warm, inside the bed.

Before me, in the dawn light, stood Sam. He was soaking wet, his blond hair now brown with damp and grime, his skin flushed of colour. He wore a thin coat, thrown over a nightshirt. He had evidently dressed in a hurry and run as fast as he could out of the door to go in search of me because he thought had gone missing. Because he cared about me. He was soaked to the skin and large droplets of rain fell from his nose and chin.

“Sam…” I began.

He held up a hand to stop me. His hand too, looked pallid and raw from the cold and the rain.

“Sammy!” his mother cried, running to embrace him.

“’Ello, Ma..” he murmured, shouldering her embrace but not committing to it fully.

“You’re soakin’ wet, Sammy. Come on. Let’s get you changed. Esther come back a few hours ago Sam. She’s been sleepin’.”

“Has she..?” he asked, sarcastically.

“Come on Sammy. Let’s get you in some uvver clothes.”

“In a minute, Ma, fanks. I gotta talk to Esther.”

His blue eyes turned once again on me and, this time, there was venom in them. I knew what was coming and I braced myself for it, gulping slightly and licking my lips to make sure I could speak without faltering.

“So, where’ve ya been then?” asked Sam, one eyebrow raised.

I replied in a rapid flurry, so that he could not interject.

“Listen Sam. Leland Deverill met the Red Razor Gang! Met Eddie Holloway! I saw them. I was hidden behind a crate and then…”

He held up his hand again to stop me. I was taken aback as I wanted to tell him everything, how I was in danger, how our investigation had taken a perilous turn. I wanted him to listen, to understand why I had done what I had done, to understand and to help me to stay safe.

“We do everyfink togevver,” he said after a moment that felt like an hour.

“I know. I know Sam! But, listen…”

“No, Esther. We agreed. We shook on it.”

“I know, but..”

Again his hand was held up and I stopped, scared by the look in his eyes and terrified of what I knew he was about to say.

“We agreed. And if one of us does sumfink the other one don’t know nuffink about then it’s over. We ain’t a team. We part ways.”

I was silent. Although I had known it was coming, I could not believe he had said it. After everything we had been through together. After everything I had just gone through on that quayside - getting attacked, nearly being shot.

“You can’t mean it,” I said, my voice hollow, my throat dry, “you can’t. We’re… We’re friends.”

“Friends don’t tell lies to one anuvver.”

“Sammy,” his mother said, cutting in, “this ain’t the time for…”

“No, Ma,” he retorted, “sorry, but it is. I know you’re soft on ’er, but it’s important Ma. It’s important to me.”

Mrs Wiggins moved away from her son, acceptingly.

“Sam,” I began, “I know what we agreed but… I just felt that you were telling me what to do… and…”

“Did Eddie Holloway see ya?”

“Yes.. He told Leland to kill me! And then they shot a gun at me as I was swimming away!”

“Jesus….” he murmured to himself, holding his hand up to his head in desperation.

“He said he was going to get me, Sam!”

Suddenly he rounded on me, fury in his tone.

“And this is why we do fings togevver! And why I didn’t want you to go to the meetin’! Because I knew it would end badly! And now we’re in worse bovver than we was before! You’re so… so ARROGANT!”

The word cut me to the quick and I bit back with venom, leaping out of the bed and advancing on him.

“I’m arrogant? I’m not the one who pretends to have all the answers when he hasn’t got a clue! I’m not the one who dictates where we go and what we do! I’m not the one who bangs on about shoes and hammers and chisels even though they have nothing to do with it! I’m not the one who has us wasting our time watching Hettie Deverill, instead of chasing real criminals!”

“No, you’re the one who ignored what I said and went off into the night to a situation you ’ad no idea ’ow to ’andle!”

“I did handle it!”

“Yeah, by gettin’ shot at and puttin’ yourself in Eddie Holloway’s firing line!”

“You don’t like me doing what I want because I’m a girl!”

He looked completely bewildered. I was clutching at straws I knew, but my heckles were up and he was being infuriating over what I considered to be a fairly trivial white lie.

“I don’t like you doin’ what you want because we were meant to be a team! Because we do everyfink togevver!”

“But we are a team!”

“You lied to me!” he bellowed.

“So what?” I yelled back. “Big deal! I lied to you! So what!? Why are you so bothered about it?!”

Without any warning at all he smashed his fist into the brick wall as hard as he could.

“Because he lied to me!!” he screamed and his face was etched with pain.

All the anger that had boiled up inside me immediately cooled and my jaw fell open. I was unable to think or speak. The mere sight of this invulnerable boy, of the boy who was cold and emotionless, losing his temper and hurting himself like this was unsettling.

“He lied to me…and he died.” he said, with an effort.

His mother and I stood completely still, shocked into silence.

“I’m sorry, Ma,” he whispered, turning those bright blue eyes to his mother, “It’s my fault…”

“What’s your fault Sammy?” she asked, breaking our silence with a soft, calm voice.

Sam replied in fits and starts, as if the mere act of speaking could kill him at any moment. I could see that blood was starting to drip slowly from the wound on his hand where he had punched the wall.

“The night Dad died.. ‘E wasn’t comin’ to meet me. We’d already met. ’E was on ’is way ’ome. ’E looked worried that night, somefink was up, but I didn’t know what, and ’e wouldn’t tell me. I said I wanted to walk ’ome wiv ’im. But he wouldn’t ’ave it. So I made ’im promise ’e’d get a cab. He promised me he would. He promised. And I knew it was a lie, but I didn’t say nuffink. ’Cause I was tired and it was late. I just let ’im go off into the night, ’cause I wanted to get back ’ere and sleep. And… he walked.. across that bridge…and…”

He could not bring himself to say the words. He hung his head in shame and despair.

And then I saw it… A single tear leaked from his eye and rolled down on his cheek. He immediately rubbed it away with the back of the hand that wasn’t bleeding, but it was too late. I had seen it.

My chest felt hollowed out in sorrow. I could find no words to say. No words of comfort sprung to my mind. I thought only of Sam walking home on that night, uneasy in his mind, sleeping a restless sleep, to find the next morning that his father had been killed. I wanted to weep, but no tears would come for some reason. Something was wrong inside me. Something was very wrong.

Mrs Wiggins stepped forwards and embraced Sam, holding him tightly to her.

“Sammy,” she whispered, “none of that was your fault. Your Dad… was a stubborn man. It wouldn’t ’ave mattered what you’d said. ’E would’ve walked whatever.”

“But I should’ve made ’im get the cab! I should’ve made sure.”

“Sammy, I knew your father a lot longer than you and, believe me, no-one could make that man do anyfing ’e didn’t wanna do.”

“But…”

“No buts, Sammy. It wasn’t your fault. There was

nuffink you coulda done. No way you

coulda known what was waitin’ for ’im on that bridge. People die. They die, Sammy, and, ’though we all ask ourselves what we coulda done different, they just die. And it ain’t fair. But it ain’t your fault.”

She embraced him again, clutching on to him as if he were the most precious thing on Earth, which, of course, to her he was. I watched this and, instead of feeling pleased at the sight, I felt angry. Angry? What in God’s name was wrong with me?

We all three stood there in silence for a moment.

“Come on, Sammy. Let’s get you outta these wet fings and dress your ’and,” said Mrs Wiggins gently.

Sam nodded and the two of them turned away from me to make their way upstairs. After several steps Sam stopped and turned to me.

“Sorry, Esther. I just…didn’t want the same to ’appen to you.” he said.

I nodded and smiled weakly at him to show that it was fine, that I was partly to blame, that I understood what he was going through, that I was with him heart and soul. This half-smile took all my effort to produce. I was boiling with unexpected feelings, with unwelcome feelings, with the strangest feelings I had ever felt.

Sam accepted my nod and smile, turned back towards his mother and they made their way upstairs, Mrs Wiggins’ arm around his shoulder all the way.

The instant they were out of sight, I ran out of the door as fast as I could and I did not stop running until I reached St John’s Wood, anger and resentment choking me with every step. I did not look back. I did not deviate. Something told me I had to be there and I ran and I ran and I ran.

The rain had stopped and the sun was just coming up and I looked up at the house I had once called ‘home’ as golden shafts of light illuminated its upper storey and the room I had been trapped in for years.

I wanted to think of Sam and his father, of the terrible guilt that he had carried with him, of the horrible demise of his father. Instead, my thoughts were of my own parents. Of my real parents who had died when I was only an infant. Of the parents whose death had changed my life so irrevocably. Of the parents who had left me to fend for myself, before I had the bad fortune to cross paths with Ulysses Morstan-Eyre. And I wept for them. And I wept for the three-year old Esther, and for the Esther she would become. I did not weep for Sam. I wept for Esther.

Now you know what a selfish creature I am.

As I stood there weeping, I suddenly became aware of my surroundings and some sort of muffled cry. My world came sharply into focus within a split second and I knew that something was wrong.

The cry I had heard was a single word – “Help!” It had been a woman’s cry.

It was coming from the jetty at the side of the house. I snapped myself out of my self-pity and I ran around to the jetty as fast as I could.

And there I saw it, in the half-light –

The black figure of Death, hooded and cloaked, standing over a girl. A girl in a crinoline, pink dress, trimmed in lace. My dress.

And the girl… was me. And I was being throttled by Death with a dark, thick band he was holding in gloved hands.

The bewilderment lasted for the narrowest of moments and then I realised with a jolt who the girl was.

Not me, but Aunt Cordelia! Aunt Cordelia wearing my pink dress!

Aunt Cordelia, about to breathe her last breath on this Earth, as the cloaked figure tightened his murderous grip around her slender neck.