The Return of Moriarty (29 page)

A short time later a boy, not unlike one of the runners used by Parker, came trotting down the street, heading undeniably for Green's door; but, as he too passed the shadows, a foot reached out and tripped him thudding into the gutter, whence he was quickly lifted bodily and carried away, a hard and calloused hand stifling any sound from his small mouth.

Just after the half hour, a tall bulky man, dressed in a long, dark greatcoat with a tall, battered hat crammed straight upon his head, came from the house. He closed the door carefully behind him and stood for a moment looking furtively up and down the street. His red, craggy face, scarred and pitted like a battlefield, was clearly visible, and it seemed as though he were listening for any sound, watching for any untoward movement.

After a second or two he turned and began walking steadily in the direction of the Commercial Road. He did not get there—finishing his journey, trussed like a Christmas goose, in the back of a small van, which also contained the bound and straining bodies of the two men and the boy who had recently attempted to enter the house.

Paget and his men arrived, singly and in twos and threes, gathering in the environs of the Commercial Road a shade before nine o'clock, the omnipresent Parker creeping out of the smoky darkness to appear at Paget's elbow.

“They're all still inside, but for one fellow we've taken,” he breathed.

“Green and Butler as well?”

“Been there all day. You have 'em on dripping, Pip.”

“I'll make the bastards drip.” Paget's blood was up, ready for the most important fray of the night. “How many you got at the back, then?”

“Four, but none of any weight.”

Paget nodded and issued calm instructions, sending four of his beefiest men to the rear of the house to cut off possible escapers and trap the inhabitants in a two-pronged attack.

He already had a rough idea of the interior, Moriarty having obtained details from one of the neighboring houses that was a twin to Green's headquarters. It was a tall, narrow building, stretching back a fair length to a small walled piece of unkempt garden. Inside the front door, a passage ran to a large room at the rear, one door to the left leading to what would normally be a front parlor. The downstairs room at the back of the house led, in turn, to a small kitchen, and the stairs in the hallway took one up to the second and third stories, which contained three rooms apiece. Above these there was an attic—visible from the street by its small dormer windows.

When all was ready, Paget gave the long and trembling whistle, which was the signal, and the main body of his party moved at a rush toward the front door, which they smashed in with three splintering blows of a sledgehammer.

Michael Green had undoubtedly been alerted but was not yet fully prepared. As they piled through the door, a figure flitted from the front-parlor door: a lookout who had, perhaps, dozed at his post by the window. He hurled himself toward the big rear room, from where sounds—shouts and the noise of sudden scuffling—were emanating.

About six of Paget's men were in the hall when the fleeing figure reached the doorway, turned, and fired five shots into the advancing huddle. He fired wildly, but with some success: Paget was unhurt, but three of his men fell, one of them never to rise again.

Before the echo of the first shot had died, Paget had his revolver from his belt and was returning the fire. There was a crash from the rear of the house—Paget's men at the back forcing their entry—then, like a great wave, they rushed the room at the end of the passage, a tributary of five or so men leaving the main force to pound up the stairs.

The opposing parties met in the large rear room, Green's men sandwiched between Paget's two assault groups in a ferocious hand-to-hand grapple. They fought for their lives—all of them—for it was a deadly business and they did not play it by any rules of honor or chivalry or those drawn up by the Marquess of Queensberry.

The men closed on each other, biting, punching, gouging, kicking, using the elbow and knee as well as the fist, and hitting stomachs, eyes and genitals, so that the heaving and enclosed space was filled with grunts and cries, the cracking of bone and knuckles and the raw shrieks of pain.

Paget was aware of Michael Green somewhere near the kitchen door, but he did not glimpse Butler in the general melee. He heaved himself in the direction of Green, but was occupied immediately by a short, barrel of a man much experienced in the arts of hand-to-hand combat. He came at Paget, first with a wicked long-bladed knife, swinging low and dangerously, holding the weapon in front of him, jabbing forward.

Paget, reacting in the only possible way—for he still had his revolver out—pulled back with his thumb on the hammer and pressed the trigger. There was a wasted fraction of a second before he realized the weapon was jammed; then at the last moment he brought the gun down hard on his assailant's knife hand. Heavy as he was, the man sidestepped lightly so that Paget's pistol only brushed his sleeve—Paget himself twisting to the right to avoid the vicious thrust aimed at his belly.

The revolver was useless except as a projectile and Paget, recovering, hurled it full at his attacker's face, but again the man ducked, head low, his body propelled fast toward Paget's front, now offered as a large target, the knife flicking from side to side so that Paget could not tell from where the final thrust would come.

He shot out a fist, aiming a long arm at the top of the chiv-artist's chest, a little below the throat, and felt it connect hard. His aggressor let out a sudden gasp, the breath expelled from him like steam out of a railway engine, his face red, with a cluster of small warts around the left nostril, sweat filmed over the brow, below untidy hair, and running in thin rivulets down his cheeks.

Paget moved, surely and with speed, while the man was still winded, before his knife arm could come up again. It took only a second to consolidate: a knee hard to the groin, and the blade of his right hand chopping, like a cleaver, across the throat.

The barreled man gave a howl of agony as Paget's knee squelched home, doubling and dropping the knife, the cry cut short as the hand sank into his throat, sending him gurgling backward to crash against the feet of other struggling men and lie still.

Paget was braced forward, lunging out to grab at his revolver, which lay inactive on the floor, the air around him heavy with sweat and the scent of blood.

As he straightened, Paget saw Green send one of the punishers spinning back into the confusion as he whirled and grabbed for the kitchen door.

Paget went after him, shouldering the struggling, fighting pairs out of the way and fending off one attacker with his boot. But by the time he reached the door Green was away. A man's body lay close to the wall, almost blocking the kitchen entrance so that Paget had to hoist him away with his heel, losing precious moments before he followed the Peg into the darkness beyond.

He had lost him again, for the back door, leading from the kitchen to the walled garden, lay back on its hinges and from the outside he could hear panting and the thud of muffled footsteps.

Paget leaned against the jamb, quickly examining his revolver, clearing the blockage before lurching toward the outer door.

Michael Green was pulling himself up the far wall at the end of the garden, outlined for a moment against the dingy sky. Paget took careful aim and fired, but as he did so, Green launched himself down the far side of the wall.

By the time Paget reached the brickwork and followed the route taken by Moriarty's usurper, the wanted bird had flown, leaving neither trace nor sound.

Unwillingly Paget retraced his steps back to the house, where the confusion had died, for his men were by now in full control—tending their own wounded and lining up those of Green's men who were still able to stand. The job was done but, it seemed, without having accomplished the main task of taking either Green or Butler.

The men who had flushed out the upper stories of the house brought down only four of Green's bullies.

“No sign of Butler?” Paget asked several of the punishers, only to receive glum negative answers.

He knew they had not much time, for it could not be long before the police would arrive; but as he stood between the rear downstairs room and the kitchen, he became conscious, among the panting and groans around him, of a quiet, though stubborn, sound of sobbing. He traced the noise to the back of the kitchen, where a girl huddled in the corner.

Roughly Paget pulled her out into the light.

“What's this, then, Green's whore?”

He could hear the gruffness in his own voice and there was a picture in his mind of the circumstances reversed: Green saying something similar to Fanny Jones.

The girl blubbered, a tired and fragile florence. Her face grimed and her brown skirt stained with grease and too much exposure to cooking; her hair was a natural light shade, but unkempt and dirty: in all a sorry sight.

“Who are you then? Come on, girl, we haven't time to waste.” Again rough and jabbing, the words like blows.

“The attic …” the creature sniveled. “For God's sake, sir, get to the attic.…”

“Butler? Is Butler in the attic?”

“No, sir, he went over the wall after your men broke in. He gave me this.” Paget could now see the dark swelling and broken skin on the girl's left cheek. “The attic. A man called Bert….

In the fury of the attack Paget had momentarily forgotten Bert Spear. He made for the stairs, motioning two of the punishers to follow, dragging the still tearful girl with him.

Spear was alone in the attic, lying on his back, across the dirty mattress. For a minute they thought he was dead, for Green and Butler had left him in a pitiful condition, with his face battered and caked with blood, the brands of burns on his shoulders and upper arms, and unspeakable things done to his fingernails and hands.

Only as they lifted him did Spear regain consciousness and groan.

“It's all right, Bert. It's Pip. We've got you now. We're taking you back to Limehouse.”

Weakly Spear lifted his head. “You get the bastards, Pip?”

“Not all, but Green's organization's smashed for good.”

Spear appeared to smile. “The girl … the girl, Bridget. Good girl … get her out.”

Paget turned toward the slattern. “Is that you?”

She nodded. “I'm Bridget. He was good to me.”

“You'd best come with us then.”

They carried Spear out and laid him in one of the carts waiting in the side lanes. When it rumbled away, Paget took the girl by the arm.

“Come on then.” He smelled the reek of Green's house still on her. “There's a cab waiting near Aldgate. Can you walk that far?”

She nodded. “Will he be all right?”

Paget drew her alongside him, stepping out since he did not want any contact with the police, who were by this time in Nelson Street.

“Who? Bert Spear?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“He'll be there before us. They'll look after him.”

She tried to fall into step beside him, almost running to keep up.

“Are you the Professor's men?” she asked, panting with the exertion.

“What do you know of him?”

“I heard things. Back there. Even though they kept me in the house I still heard things.”

“They kept you in? For what purpose?”

“To cook for them and serve them.…” She paused. “In every way. Bastards, you should've got the Peg and that brute Butler.”

“It's what we came for. But we'll catch them, girl. We'll get them yet. Their structure is shattered, and they cannot hide from the Professor forever.”

They came to the cab and Paget helped her inside. It would be interesting, he considered, to find out what manner of woman lay hidden behind the dirty and bedraggled creature whom Green and Butler had undeniably so misused. There had to be something in her, some spirit or attraction, for Spear to have shown the concern he had done from his tortured condition.

Quite suddenly Pip Paget felt fatigued in mind and body. The scent of the night's business was still in his nostrils and the bruises on his aching limbs. He very much wanted to hold Fanny close and hear her whisper in his ear, and, as he felt the desire, so he experienced the same confusing sense of dissatisfaction that came when thinking of Fanny—the small sunlit picture of the pair of them, and the rose-trellised cottage with the children around the woman's skirts, and clean air in his lungs.

He pushed the thoughts away, knowing how much of his life he owed to Professor Moriarty, and how impossible it would be to live any other kind of life than the one already etched out for him by his master in crime. Paget would not have understood if someone had told him that he was a romantic at heart.

The Limehouse headquarters ran with activity: men having their wounds tended by the women, others sorting through the goods pillaged from Togger and Krebitz, taking drink and even washing the night's sweat from their bodies—not a favored pastime among their fraternity, but one encouraged by the Professor.

In his chambers Moriarty heard the news and was elated by the way in which his men had demolished his rivals, though he was profoundly disturbed and irritated to hear that both Green and Butler had so narrowly missed being taken.

“You think they had prior intelligence of our plans?” he asked Paget, who sat in front of the desk with the dust and blood of the night still on him.

“They were certain sure that you had returned. You know that by the ache in your own shoulder.” Moriarty still wore a sling on his damaged arm. “But,” Paget continued, “I do not think they knew any full details. Unless …” His voice trailed away as though carried on the wind.

“Unless?” The Professor fixed him with the deep eyes, head turning slowly twice.

Paget sighed. “Unless they wrang it from Spear, though I doubt that, for the preparation was little. It was as though they had just got wind of matters and were desperate what to do. After all, none of their other people were warned.”