SV - 05 - Sergeant Verity and the Swell Mob. Read online

  SERGEANT VERITY

  AND THE SWELL MOB

  FRANCIS SELWYN

  STEIN AND DAY/ Publishers New York

  FIRST STEIN AND DAY PAPERBACK EDITION 1984 Sergeant Verily and the Swell Mob was first published in hardcover in the United States of America by Stein and Day/ Publishers in 1981.

  Copyright 1981 by Francis Selwyn

  All rights reserved, Stein and Day, Incorporated

  Printed in the United States of America

  STEIN AND DAY/Publishers

  Scarborough House

  Briarcliff Manor. N.Y. 10510

  ISBN 0-8128-8050-1

  The Shah Jehan Clasp

  In those ever-famous days of September 1857, when our infantry and light horse stormed the rebel city of Delhi, the treasury of the Mogul Emperors was broke open. Its masterpiece was the rich clasp of Shah Jehan, or Shah Jahan, ruler of India two centuries since. This great clasp formed a sarpesh or turban-ornament, a fine tall plume cut in white jade and encrusted with gold. It bears a perfect galaxy of diamonds of the first water, a leaf-pattern of emeralds with precious stones. But who shall describe that blood-red ruby at its base, that most exquisitely carved Burmah stone?

  Tradition avers that Shah Jehan's curse shall fall wherever unlawful hands despoil his treasure. For this, his sarpesh was nicknamed 'The Devil's Clasp'. Of its recent history, but little is known. It was sold for an unnamed vendor in 1858 by Dubouq, Rivery & Fils, in Paris. During two weeks it was displayed at the Crystal Palace among souvenirs of the late Sepoy rebellion. Where it now rests, or what fortune attends its owner, I am not able to discover.

  —Captain J. H. Monck-Learmont A Rider with Hodson's Light Horse London, 1860

  CONTENTS

  1 STUNNING JOE

  2 A TAME JACK

  3 TICKET OF LEAVE

  4 SEALSKIN KITE'S LITTLE TICKLE

  STUNNING JOE

  1

  Stunning Joe O'Meara hung by his fingers in the high starlight, like a thin black spider. Fifty feet below him, the shaded cobbles of the stable yard held their promise of shattered bone, the lingering death of a body broken on the wheel. He pressed himself gently against the rose-coloured brickwork of Wannock Hundred. Even in naming a Sussex mansion, Baron Lansing had given it an air of bogus antiquity.

  Stunning Joe's bony fingers were hooked over the dressed stone of the highest window ledge. His spread legs had found lodgements for his toes where the mortar of the Georgian bricks was loose and crumbling. Lean and light-boned as a child, he was hardly visible in the night, wearing his black breeches of tight moleskin, his dark vest and thin canvas shoes.

  He worked his way along the high mansion wall, the cold memory of a drop to the cobbles always behind him, the tiled eaves a few feet above him. Holding the ledge by one hand, he stretched the other out, caressing the rough brick surface to one side. The little file between his fingers dug at the mortar. Tiny fragments rattled on the stones far below. Stunning Joe tested the finger-hold, trusted it, and slowly moved his other hand along the stone window-ledge.

  Clamped like a limpet against the wall, he drew a deep breath of air in the crisp November night. Below him a light breeze stirred the remaining leaves of the park elms. A fox barked clear and cold on the moonlit flank of downland. Further still, where the starlight struck a flat pale reflection, he caught the distant shell-sound of the flood tide running between Seaford and Beachy Head. In the shadow of the eaves his head moved in sharp brief glances. The slick black hair shaped a skull that had the narrow keenness of a ferret.

  Alone in the cold silence of his spider-perch, he touched the toe of a canvas shoe along the line of mortar, feeling for his next foothold. A stable clock in its white-painted cupola chimed the half hour. Time was not important to him just then. What mattered was that he should achieve complete surprise. The window of the Baron Lansing's library would be armed against any upward attack. But it was beyond imagination that a thief could walk round two sheer walls of the house and come from above. No other spiderman in London would have looked at such a route.

  Two men had tried the simple method of scaling the house front. But razor-sharp glass was set cunningly in the mortar and the pipes and ledges coated invisibly with tree-grease at a cruel height. The first man was now serving a ten-year sentence in the penal colony of Parramatta. His companion was in the hospital of Clerkenwell prison, his shattered body held in the agony of an iron brace.

  Clutching the tiny crevices of the sheer wall, Stunning Joe glanced aside and saw the next window ledge almost within reach. His fingers touched it, the other hand moved to the niche vacated by the first. As his weight shifted, he snatched hand over hand and swung easily along the stone projection.

  Round the next corner of the building, though at a lower level, was the library window. The room contained the Lansing emerald, and diamonds to the value of £10,000. Its other treasure was beyond price. The Shah Jehan clasp, sarpesh or turban-ornament of the Mogul emperors, had been seized by the British army during the sack of Delhi in 1857. How it came to be sold in Paris, or what the Baron Lansing had paid for it was a mystery. With infinite patience Stunning Joe edged his way toward such treasures as no other Bramah safe had ever held. Old Mole and Sealskin Kite, the putters-up of the robbery, had promised him it should be so.

  And neither Old Mole nor Mr Kite had ever been mistaken before.

  The corner of the wall posed the greatest danger, though there was a pipe running up to the gutter on the near side. Lower down the smooth metal would have a lethal smear of grease. At this height, Stunning Joe tested it with his fingers and found it clean. Gripping it with his knees, he could just see the outline of the darkened library window beyond the projection of the wall. He adjusted the canvas strap on his shoulder, feeling the weight of the small bag on his back. The thin metal frame of the jack-in-the-box and the other tools which it contained would be more than equal to any safe which Joseph Bramah could construct.

  Immediately above the library was a "blind window', a decorative relic of the days of the window tax. It was a shallow recess, matching the shape of the one beneath to complete the symmetry of the facade. Stunning Joe looked down and saw the broader stone of the sill below. He knew that to set hand or foot on it would probably be the end of him. Instead, he hung by his hands from the upper recess, then released his grip and fell. For a fraction of a second the wind roared at his ears and then the rough coping stone above the library window smacked into his hand like a blow. His other fingers stung with the coldness of torn skin, but the grip of one hand was all that he needed.

  He worked with great care, though he knew that the Baron Lansing himself was at his town house in Portman Square and would not be expected at Wannock Hundred for two more days. The tiny diamond in the ring on Stunning Joe's finger took out the little square of glass above the window catch. The glass itself fell on the carpet inside without a sound. In a moment more the top half of the window glided down and the agile bony legs swung in over it, dropping to the floor of the room like a gymnast.

  With the curtains open the moonlight of the clear November night was all the assistance he required. First and most important, he went to the door of the room, putting his eye to the crack and seeing that it was unlocked. He slipped off the canvas shoulder straps and took from his bag a small picklock with a hooked end. So much ingenuity was given to preventing locks being opened but closing them remained relatively simple. Stunning Joe eased the tumblers gently, one at a time, and heard the metal bolt click home under the pressure of its spring. He took a steel watch-pin and jammed it in the space where one of the tumblers had been. It would take a lock
smith to move it now. Turning round, he went to work undisturbed on the safe.

  The Bramah stood behind a green velvet curtain next to the Baron Lansing's desk. Old Mole had told him that much. It was the usual iron box which trusted to the weight of its bolt rather than to the strength of the mechanism. It was a job for the jack-in-the-box.

  Stunning Joe took out the heavy brass stock of the instrument. Into one end he fitted a steel wedge, like the blade of a huge chisel. Into the head of the shaft at the other end went a steel lever, a foot long and an inch thick. By winding the lever round, the steel wedge was driven slowly forward with a pressure between three and four tons. Ignoring the lock, Stunning Joe applied the thin edge of the steel to the crack on the hinge side of the safe door. Kneeling at his task, the veins of his forehead contoured with exertion, he wound the steel lever like a mill-blade. There was no sound but the shrill scraping of metal. Several times he stopped for breath. Then at last he felt the door of the safe start, as one of the hinge screws jarred loose. When that happened, he knew he had won.

  Patience and effort brought the screws out, one by one, each easier than the last, until the safe-door was free on that side. Stunning Joe laid the door aside and inspected the interior. There were several jewel cases in dark red or green leather and a diamond pendant in a nest of black velvet. He scooped them out and put them in a square of thick cloth.

  There were half a dozen wash-leather bags of sovereigns, and he added these as well. Then he did the cloth up, like a workman's lunch, and put it in the crossed webbing of his shoulder-straps.

  He was about to leave when someone rattled the china handle of the door. There was a spoken exchange between two men outside. He could not make out the words, but the tone was one of irritation rather than alarm. Their footsteps receded.

  He tightened the shoulder-straps again and pulled himself out over the window frame. By standing on its wooden top he could just reach the lower ledge of the sham-window above him. And that, for Stunning Joe, was enough. It was hardly midnight. There were six or seven hours of darkness before him with no more to do than retrace his route and walk away into the Sussex lanes. As a final precaution, he released his grip with one hand and pulled out the thick cloth with its bundle of jewel cases. It was no larger than a pineapple and just as light. Gently, he lobbed it out into the darkness, so that it fell into the yew hedge beside the drive. He followed the gentle parabola of its descent with his eyes, knowing that he could find the bundle again within a few seconds.

  After that, it was a matter of patience and infinite care. If he should lose his hold or disturb the guardians of Wannock Hundred, at least there would be no evidence upon him. Not that Joe O'Meara had any intention of doing either. As he told himself, he was now a very rich man. Caution was the best policy. His only unease was over the Shah Jehan clasp. It was famous, repeatedly illustrated in the picture papers after its capture at Delhi. For two weeks it had even been on public display. A man could neither eat it nor sell it — except to some rummy cove who would gloat over it in secret behind his locked door.

  Old Mole and Mr Kite had abler brains than his for such matters and Stunning Joe was content to leave the disposal of the heathen sarpesh to them.

  He edged his way round to an angle of the mansion wall, where two sets of windows rose at right angles to one another. Their upper and lower ledges were as easy to him as a ladder. With a speed which any circus acrobat would have envied, he made his descent. Standing on the upper ledge of the highest coping, he sprang sideways and downwards across the right angle, catching the lower ledge of the opposite casement in his strong fingers. With hardly a pause Joe launched himself sideways again to seize the next upper ledge of the first flight of windows. Side to side, he dropped nimbly down the levels of the dressed stone, his hands finding their hold with the lightness of a cat.

  At last he hung from the upper ledge of the ground-floor window, barred like a prison cell. He listened intently to satisfy himself that the house was still in silence. Not a dog barked in the stable yard. Soundlessly he dropped to the cobbles, turned with his back to the wall and listened to the quiet November night.

  From the shadows of the house about six feet beyond where he stood, a figure stepped into the starlight. It had the heavy shoulders of a fighter and a tall chimney-pot hat. There was just enough light to show the ginger mutton-chop whiskers.

  ‘ 'ello, Stunning Joe,' said Sergeant Albert Samson amicably. 'Come a bit early for the house party, ain't yer? Guests isn't invited till Saturday.'

  Joe O'Meara, cornered in the angle of the wall, looked desperately about him, the beaked nose and the ferret-eyes yearning for escape. But there were other figures coming out of the darkness now, half a dozen burly shapes. With the instinct of panic he turned back to the wall, leaping for the upper ledge of the barred window.

  'Come on, Joseph!' said Sergeant Samson firmly. 'We ain't got all night to watch you capering about on the roof. You'll only be fetched down in the end. And I shan't half be in a wax over you!'

  As though to chafe his fingers, he was kneading one set of large knuckles in the palm of the other hand. Stunning Joe turned slowly to face him.

  'All right!' he said savagely.

  ' 'at's the boy, Joe!' Samson clipped the metal cuffs on O'Meara's wrists until they almost bit the skin. 'What would you a-done next?'

  'I'd a-got in, most like,' said Stunning Joe quickly. 'I was just going to find a better way. 'eard there was a cove going to crack the crib tonight. Thought I'd steal a bit of a march on 'im.'

  Samson laughed indulgently and turned to one of the shadowy figures who handed him the cloth bundle, which Joe had lobbed into the bushes. He clapped a friendly hand on the prisoner's shoulder.

  ‘You ain't half a caution, my son!'

  They turned him about and marched him into the kitchen of the house. Samson, Stunning Joe and three uniformed constables stood round the scrubbed pine table. There was also a tall dark man with the air of a senior clerk.

  'Mr Bunker,' said Samson, for Joe's benefit. 'London Indemnity Assurance. You might a-cost his firm a penny, my lad!'

  The cloth bundle was opened and its treasures spread upon the table. Bunker stooped over them, one by one. Finally he stood up, holding a dark green jewel case of polished leather.

  'Just this one, sergeant,' he said sharply. 'Broken open and emptied.'

  Samson's composure vanished, the blue eyes filling with deep apprehension.

  ‘What should be in it, then, Mr Bunker?'

  Bunker drew himself up with the air of an actor about to deliver the concluding lines of a melodrama.

  The Shah Jehan clasp!' he said softly.

  The sense of grievance which Stunning Joe had felt ever since Samson's appearance was overwhelmed by a feeling of physical sickness.

  'It can't be missing!' he squealed, frightened for the first time. ‘Unless it fell out p'raps!' He was now as eager to recover the jewel as any of his captors. Bunker turned his back on Joe and addressed the explanation to Samson.

  The locked jewel cases were placed in the safe as soon as the intended robbery was heard of. The Baron Lansing has the key to the safe with him, in London. The safe was not opened again until its door was forced by the thief.'

  Samson nodded and turned to Stunning Joe.

  'Right, my son. Where's that bleedin' jool to?'

  'Not on 'im, sarge,' said a uniformed constable helpfully.

  'Where is it, Joseph?' The left palm was kneading the right-hand knuckles again.

  'I never had it, Mr Samson!' said O’Meara shrilly. ‘I swear I may be damned if I so much as saw it!'

  Bunker and the three constables looked pointedly away.

  ‘Don't play me up, Joseph,' said Samson gently. The bunched knuckles came up, short and fast, into the narrow stomach. There was a start and an abrupt retching sound from the handcuffed prisoner.

  'Now then,' said Samson pleasantly, ‘Where d'you say that jool was?'

  Stunnin
g Joe, his wrists locked behind him, was bowing over the table with perspiration starting on his forehead. His words came breathlessly.

  If it ain't there now,' he said miserably, 'it never was in the safe.'

  And then, to the embarrassment of the others, he began to weep silently. Samson laid a hand on his shoulder again.

  'You mean, Mr Bunker ain't telling the truth? Or Baron Lansing's been having us all on?'

  'I don't know, Mr Samson! I don't know!’ There was no mistaking the abject howl of despair.

  Samson sighed.

  'Well then, Stunning Joseph, I’ll tell you how it looks to me. I been brought all the way from the Private-Clothes Detail in Scotland Yard. And I ain't that partial to countryside, meself. What I see is all the Lansing jools locked up snug in the safe. And then, with me own eyes, I see you, going in through that window and coming out with the spondoolicks. Course, you had a few minutes to make away with any little trinket, before you and me struck up our acquaintance in the stable yard. That emperor's clasp, what was sworn to as being in its box before your game began, ain't anywhere to be seen. No one touched that box but you, my son.'

  O’Meara made his last defiance. 'They must a-done! They bloody must!' Samson ignored the outburst.

  'I ain't got more time to waste, Joseph, seeing the grounds’ll have to be searched presently. So I’ll put it to you like this. When the business comes to court, who's going to be believed? Banker Lansing with more money in Pall Mall than you ever dreamt of? Or a bleedin' little thief like you?'

  2

  Stunning Joe gave his gaolers no trouble in the weeks before his trial at the Old Bailey sessions. Once before he had been lodged briefly in the grim neo-classical fortress of Newgate prison, next to the Central Criminal Court. They brought him in apart from the other prisoners, through the lodge, with its iron-bolted doors and window grilles. The way led along a narrow gas-lit passage, lined with the plaster death-masks of the murderers who had been hanged on the public platform outside the press yard. At the end of this was the great nave of the prison under its glass roof, five floors of cells rising on either side with their iron balustrades and spiral ladders.