Shadow of the Hangman (28 page)

‘Who else, my lord?’

Sidmouth picked up the copy of
The Times
on his desk and waved it.

‘This contains an article about the deliberations of the joint commission on the massacre at Dartmoor prison. Someone has leaked their verdict in advance.’

‘What is it?’

‘It’s one of justifiable homicide,’ said Sidmouth. ‘How will Thomas O’Gara and Moses Dagg react to that, do you think?’

Dermot Fallon hired a horse and cart so that all three of them could drive to a leafy suburb where they’d be unlikely to be disturbed. When they’d found a wood that suited their purpose, O’Gara used a dagger to carve something into the trunk of a tree. As he stepped back, the others saw that it was the shape of a head.

‘You go first, Moses,’ said O’Gara.

Dagg had already loaded the pistol. Holding it at arm’s length, he took aim and fired. There was a loud report then O’Gara examined the tree.

‘Well done!’ he said. ‘You blew his brains out first time.’

Hannah Granville was still in turmoil. While her career as an actress had reached a new peak, her private life was tortured with regret. She still found it difficult to believe that she’d been so comprehensively deceived by Paul Skillen. The realisation had been a severe blow to her. In an effort to shed her preoccupation with him, she went to the theatre an hour earlier than usual that evening so that she could be alone in her dressing room and concentrate on the performance that lay ahead. She was greeted by the stage doorkeeper who gave her several letters of congratulation that had been delivered by hand. Hannah looked forward to reading them. When she entered the dressing room, however, there was no chance of even opening them because she had company. Paul Skillen was seated in a chair.

‘Good evening, Hannah,’ he said, rising to his feet.

‘How did
you
get in here?’ she gasped.

‘I always told you that I was resourceful.’

She turned away. ‘I’ll have you thrown out at once.’

‘No, no,’ he said, stepping between her and the door. ‘Please listen to what I have to say. If you still wish me to go, I’ll walk out of your life for ever.’

‘You’ve already done that, Paul. When I saw you in the audience with your wife, I saw how cruelly I’d been misled.’

He laughed. ‘So that’s it! I prayed that it might be.’

‘It’s hardly a subject for amusement.’

‘I’m laughing with relief, Hannah, don’t you see? My sister-in-law
told me what happened when she met you in that shop in Piccadilly. You snubbed her.’

Hannah froze. ‘Did you call her your sister-in-law?’

‘Yes, her name is Charlotte.’

‘She told me that she was your wife. I saw her with you
twice
.’

‘What you saw was my twin brother, Peter,’ he explained. ‘We are often mistaken for each other.’ She remained unconvinced. ‘If you don’t believe me, I’ll take you to their house after the performance and you’ll see for yourself.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me that you had a twin brother?’

‘I wanted you all to myself, Hannah – and I still do.’

Her voice softened. ‘You’ve given me so much anguish, Paul.’

‘Then I apologise unreservedly. By the same token, however, you’ve given me great pain. How do you think I felt when I saw you leaving the theatre with that handsome young man?’ She stifled a laugh. ‘Don’t deny it. By the sound of it, you were seen with him by my sister-in-law as well. He’s my replacement.’

‘Yes, I was seen with him,’ she confessed, ‘but Felix is not a replacement for you. It would be very improper, for a start. Felix Dalrymple is my half-brother. He was in London for a few days so we spent time together, that is all. I needed a man to keep my admirers at arm’s length and Felix did that admirably. How strange!’ she went on. ‘I have been in agony over this phantom wife of yours and you thought that I’d turn to the first man who paid me a charming compliment. What a pair we are, Paul!’

The differences between them had suddenly dissolved completely. Hannah no longer wanted him to abandon the dangerous work that meant so much to him and Paul no longer bridled at the thought that someone was imposing limitations on him. In retrospect, their
disagreement seemed petty. All that mattered now was that they were back together again.

Paul smiled at her. ‘Why don’t you lock that door?’

When they tumbled out of The Peacock that night, Micah Yeomans and Alfred Hale had drunk so much that they needed the assistance of a wall to remain upright. After staggering the best part of a hundred yards, they rested against the window of a tailor’s shop. Yeomans was offended.

‘The Doctor has done it again,’ he complained. ‘He’s giving someone else undeserved credit. We had to listen to him praising the Skillen brothers for rescuing that woman when he should have been berating them for letting the villains get away to cause even worse trouble. Luckily,
we’re
the ones who’ll be guarding the Doctor at the celebration. We’ll show Peter and Paul how it should be done.’

Hale was worried. ‘We could be in danger ourselves, Micah.’

‘We live with that danger every day.’

‘This is different,’ said the other. ‘We know the streets of London. Wherever we go, we can take care of ourselves. There’ll be thousands of people in Hyde Park on the great day. An attack could come from any of them. We can’t possibly keep an eye on them all.’ He gave a shiver. ‘I don’t fancy being shot in the back with a poisoned arrow.’

‘That won’t happen, Alfred,’ said the other, contemptuously. ‘That warning about a poisoned arrow was nonsensical. It was dreamt up by Peter Skillen to give the Doctor a fright.’

‘But they found a bow and arrow and a bottle of poison.’

‘So they say.’

‘According to the apothecary who examined it, that poison would have been fatal. Just imagine that, Micah.’

‘I don’t believe a word of it,’ said Yeomans with an extravagant
gesture. ‘And I certainly don’t believe that Mrs Levitt is involved in the conspiracy. She’s there to clean the rooms, for heaven’s sake. She probably can’t even read or write.’

Bernard Grocott also had doubts that Ruth Levitt was in any way responsible for the theft of secret information from the Home Office. Having found and appointed her, he felt that he knew her better than anybody. He’d also enjoyed the praise of his colleagues for replacing Anne Horner so soon and with such an efficient deputy. Grocott refused to believe that his judgement had been so fallible. When he let himself into the building early the next morning, he expected to find every room as clean as it usually was and every desk gleaming. Entering his office, however, he had a profound shock. It was exactly as he’d left it the previous evening. The place had reverted to its earlier chaos. She was gone. Ruth Levitt had not been anywhere near the Home Office.

Grocott slumped in his chair and braced himself for the collective censure of everyone with whom he worked. Admiration would very quickly turn to reproof. The woman he’d brought into the Home Office had been there as a spy. Colleagues would taunt him about that for a long time to come. The question that they – and the Home Secretary, for that matter – would ask was who had recommended her to Grocott in the first place. He searched his memory like a dog digging frantically for a bone but a name failed to appear. Grocott accepted the awful truth.

He didn’t know.

Ruth Levitt was seated in the drawing room of her house with her guests. She had shed the crumpled dress she’d worn as a cleaner and was now wearing fine attire that altered her appearance completely. Her hair
had been brushed and she had a dignity absent during her time at the Home Office. Having done what she was paid to do, she was distressed to hear that the information she’d gleaned had been lost. In her eyes, it meant that her time as a servant had been wasted. She was bitter.

‘After all that effort, we have nothing to show for it,’ she protested.

‘That’s not true,’ said Diamond. ‘Losing that list of names was a pity but I did have a chance to study the seating plan at the celebrations. I know exactly where our target will be sitting now.’

‘What use is that if they’re aware of your plan, Vincent? You were followed to the house by someone who’d certainly have searched it afterwards. If they’re clever enough to find you, they’d have the intelligence to work out what you had in mind.’

‘Then we simply amend the plan,’ argued Jane. ‘I know how you must feel, Ruth. It was demeaning for you to pretend to be a cleaner when you have servants at your beck and call here.’

‘I did it because I believed in our cause.’

‘And because you were extremely well paid,’ Diamond pointed out.

‘I earned my money,’ she retorted. ‘You didn’t. Thanks to your blunder, you lost everything that you’d extorted out of Beyton.’

‘Forget about him. He betrayed us and we did as we threatened. His wife now knows all about his antics. He’d have got a frosty welcome home yesterday.’

‘They’ll be searching for us now,’ said Jane.

‘Yes,’ he agreed, ‘we must be very careful.’

‘Well, they won’t find me,’ insisted Ruth, ‘because the house is in my late husband’s name. And they’ll never work out that my maiden name was Regine Le Vite, hence the change to Levitt. Like both of you, I had a French father and an English mother.’

‘My father died years ago,’ he said, ‘fighting against the British army.’

‘Mine never lived to see France defeated,’ said Jane, ‘and I’m glad of it. It would have broken his heart to watch Napoleon being humbled and the royal family restored to the throne by our enemies.’

‘Let’s concentrate on our plan,’ suggested Diamond. ‘Since they found the bow and arrow, we’ll have to abandon that mode of attack. It had the advantage of being unexpected but that’s no longer the case.’

‘What will we do?’

‘It’s more a question of what you and Ruth do.’

‘I’ll do anything I’m asked,’ said Ruth, ‘as long as it doesn’t involve cleaning and polishing. A night at the Home Office used to leave me exhausted.’

‘They’ve seen Jane and me,’ he told her. ‘They’ll be on the lookout for a man and a woman. The sight of two women is unlikely to get a second look. You’ll be at the celebrations together and I’ll tell you exactly where to go.’

‘The important thing is to have our escape planned,’ said Jane.

‘I’ll take care of that. Within the week, we’ll be back in France.’

‘I’m staying here,’ said Ruth. ‘For the most part, I hate the British but I have to admit that life is London is very comfortable.’

‘That’s your decision,’ said Jane.

There are still many details to work out,’ said Diamond, ‘but we have days to go yet so I have plenty of thinking time. I might even be able to solve the mystery that’s been plaguing me ever since yesterday.’

Ruth was puzzled. ‘What mystery is that?’

‘How can I see a man out of the front window on the opposite side of the road then bump into him again when I run out of the garden gate? There’s no way that he could have got there in time. It defies logic.’

Even if they’d stood side by side, nobody would have taken them for twins. Peter and Paul Skillen had used effective disguises. Both were dressed as gardeners with hats pulled down over their faces. Peter was wearing a false grey beard and moving at a speed commensurate with old age. Paul was pushing a wheelbarrow, stopping to pick up anything he found on the lush green sward in Hyde Park. It was two days before the celebrations and rehearsals were taking place. Marching in strict formation, the band practised one of its stirring military anthems. Peter knelt beside a flower bed and pretended to weed it.

The brothers were within a relatively short distance of the main platform. It was on that raised area, festooned with flags and bunting, that Viscount Sidmouth would be sitting with His Royal Highness, the Prince Regent, the Prime Minister and senior members of the government. Peter had reasoned that anyone with serious intentions of assassination would be certain to get the lie of the land in advance. Now that everything was finally set up, the rehearsal could be watched and the disposition of soldiers noted. Scores of people were about, drawn by curiosity and anxious to see the place where the celebrations would be held. It was impossible for Peter and Paul to pick out everyone who merited a closer inspection so they selected only the most obvious cases. All of the people who had so far been taking a more than casual interest in the main platform had turned out to be quite harmless.

Peter then spotted something of concern. A horse and cart pulled up on the road running alongside the park. Two men alighted and walked towards the main platform. There was nothing sinister about the pair. They might have been out for an afternoon stroll. It was the driver who alerted Peter. On a warm day, he was wearing a hood that all but obscured his face. What were still clearly visible, however, were the driver’s black hands. Peter rose to his feet and
removed his hat briefly by way of a signal to his brother. Leaving their work, they converged slowly on the platform. The two men from the cart didn’t notice them at first. They were too absorbed in looking at the platform and walking around it.

Before they challenged the men, Peter and Paul made sure that they got between them and the cart, thereby cutting off their means of escape. When they got close enough, they heard Irish accents. It was the confirmation they needed.

‘Good afternoon, Mr O’Gara,’ said Peter.

‘And the same to you, Mr Fallon,’ added Paul.

The greetings had an immediate effect on the men. Their instinct was to run back to the cart but their way was blocked. They therefore tried to run around the brothers in a wide arc. Peter and Paul were far too quick for them, sprinting after a man apiece until they got within reach. Peter tackled O’Gara around the legs and brought him crashing to the ground, dazing him in the process. Paul jumped on Fallon’s back and was carried a dozen yards before his weight was too much for the Irishman. A fierce fight developed between them. The advantage was very much with the detectives because they were working
with
the Bow Street Runners for once. Yeomans and his men had been lurking in some bushes in case they were needed. When they saw what was happening, they broke cover and ran towards the action.