‘That appears to have been taken,’ said Colbeck, putting the jacket aside. ‘It must have contained money. Judging by the way that it was emptied all over the floor, so did that bag.’
Leeming was annoyed. ‘We’ve lost one of our suspects to a thief.’
‘This was not the work of a thief, Victor.’
‘It must have been. They were obviously killed for the money.’
‘Not at all,’ contradicted the other. ‘The young lady died because she had the misfortune to be with Mr Ings at the time. He was the target. In my opinion, the murder was directly connected to the train robbery. He was silenced because he knew too much. Since Ings no longer had any need of it, his paymaster took the opportunity to repossess the hefty bribe that must have been paid to him.’
‘These men are more dangerous than I thought,’ said Leeming.
‘They’ll go to any lengths to cover their tracks.’
‘Does that mean the other accomplice is at risk?’
‘Yes, Victor,’ said Colbeck. ‘Unless we can find him first.’
‘And how do we do that?’
‘To be honest, I’m not sure.’ He glanced at the policeman by the door. ‘Who discovered the body?’
‘A woman named Polly Roach, sir,’ replied the man.
‘I’ll need to speak to her,’ said Colbeck, recalling that Mulryne had mentioned her name. ‘I’ve reason to believe that she knew at least one of the victims. Where is she?’
‘Being held at the station, Inspector. I must warn you that she’s very jittery. Walking in on this has upset her badly.’
‘I daresay that it has. A lot of people are going to be upset when they learn what happened here tonight. The person I feel sorry for is the man’s wife,’ said Colbeck with a sigh. ‘I’m not looking forward to breaking the news to Mrs Ings.’
Maud Ings was about to retire to bed when she heard the click of her letterbox. Taking the lamp, she went to the front door to investigate and saw a small package lying on the doormat. Puzzled as to what it might contain, she picked it up and read the bold capitals that ran across the front of it — FROM YOUR HUSBAND. She was even more mystified. She put her lamp on the hall table so that she could use both hands to open the package. As she peeled back the brown paper, she found, to her utter astonishment, that it was covering a sizeable wad of five pound notes. The arrival of such unexpected bounty was too much for her. Overcome with emotion, she burst into tears.
‘I want results, Inspector,’ shouted Tallis, rising angrily to his feet. ‘I want progress, not this incessant litany of excuses.’
‘We could not foresee that William Ings would be murdered.’
‘Perhaps not, but you could have prevented the crime by reaching him before anyone else did.’
‘That’s what I attempted to do, sir,’ said Colbeck.
‘Yes,’ snarled Tallis, ‘by employing that Irish maniac, Mulryne. Whatever possessed you to do that? The fellow is a confounded menace. When he was in the police force, his notion of making an arrest was to beat the offender to a pulp.’
‘Brendan was simply too zealous in the execution of his duties.’
‘Zealous! He was uncontrollable. I’m told that it took four officers to subdue him this evening. Was that another example of his zeal?’ asked Tallis with heavy sarcasm. ‘Why ever did you turn to him?’
‘Because he knows the Devil’s Acre from the inside.’
‘He’ll know a prison cell from the inside before I’m done with him.’
‘There were extenuating circumstances about the brawl,’ said Colbeck, ‘and, when the time is ripe, I’d like to speak up on Mulryne’s behalf. The reason that I engaged him is that he’s a good bloodhound. He did, after all, find the woman with whom William Ings had been living. Her name was Polly Roach. She was the person who raised the alarm tonight.’
‘What did she have to say for herself?’
‘She was very bitter when I questioned her earlier. Mr Ings had promised to take her away from the Acre to start a new life with him. Polly Roach offered him something that he could not find at home.’
‘I was in the army, Inspector,’ said Tallis, darkly. ‘You don’t need to tell me why married men visit whores. Our doctor was the busiest man in the regiment, trying to cure them of their folly.’ He sat down again behind his desk. ‘Now, tell me in detail what this Polly Roach said.’
Standing in front of him, Robert Colbeck gave him a terse account of his interview with the woman who had found the dead bodies and who had provided confirmation that one of the victims was William Ings. Wreathed in cigar smoke, Tallis listened in stony silence. His eye occasionally drifted to the newspapers that lay on his desk. When Colbeck finished, the Superintendent fired questions at him.
‘Do you believe this woman?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Did you find any witnesses?’
‘None, sir.’
‘How many people live in that tenement?’
‘Dozens.’
‘Yet not one of them saw or heard a stranger entering or leaving the premises? Is the place a home for the blind and deaf?’
‘People in the Devil’s Acre do not like assisting the police.’
‘So why did you rely on someone like Mulryne?’
‘Brendan is the exception to the rule.’
‘He’s a liability,’ said Tallis, acidly. ‘Whatever you do, make sure that the newspapers don’t get hold of the fact that you sought his help. I’ll have enough trouble keeping those reporters at bay when they ask me about the murder.’
‘Would you rather I spoke to them, sir?’
‘No, it’s my duty.’
‘Of course.’
‘Yours is to find these villains before they commit any more crimes. What’s your plan of campaign?’
‘Courtesy must come before anything else, Superintendent.’
‘In what way?’
‘Mrs Ings has a right to be informed of the death of her husband,’ said Colbeck. ‘It was far too late to call on her tonight. It would only have given her additional distress if she’d been hauled out of bed to be told that her husband had been murdered.’
‘While lying between foul sheets beside some pox-ridden whore.’