An Appetite for Murder (3 page)

‘Who do you think the thief was?’ asked Frances.

He gestured helplessly. ‘I really don’t know. The police insisted that it must have been someone who worked in the office, and who had tried to make it look as if a thief had broken in but had made a poor job of it. Myself, I think it could just as well have been a burglar, who had stolen the keys to the office and the safe, and had them copied.’

‘What was in the safe?’

‘Three hundred pounds and more,’ replied Sweetman. ‘It was never found. Even now I worry that there are people watching me, thinking I have it hidden somewhere and am about to retrieve it.’ He glanced about, nervously, as if afraid that there were watchers lurking in the shadowed corners of Frances’ parlour. ‘I never took that money, Miss Doughty,’ he pleaded earnestly, ‘and even if I was to find it by some chance, I could not keep it because it is not mine.’

‘How do you think Mr Gibson’s pocket book came to be in your house?’ asked Frances.

‘He had called on me a few days before the robbery and might have dropped it by accident, but of course he could not remember having missed it,’ said Sweetman. He paused. ‘Mr Gibson was not known as a gentleman who opened his pocket book very frequently.’

‘Where was it found?’

‘In a drawer. I always thought the maid had picked it up and put it away thinking it was mine, but she denied it.’

‘And now, as you say in your letter, you would like to be reunited with your family? What was the last occasion on which you saw them?’

He gave a deep shuddering sigh. ‘Oh, Miss Doughty, I never saw or spoke to them after my arrest! That was only a week after the robbery.’

‘Your wife did not visit you in the police cells or in prison?’ Frances asked, in some surprise. ‘She did not appear in court? You had no message from her?’

He shook his head miserably. ‘All I received very shortly after I was arrested was a note from her solicitor saying that she was terribly distressed by what I had done and wanted nothing more to do with me. I wrote, begging to see her, to be allowed at least to see the children, but received no reply.’

‘Why do you think she believed you to be guilty?’ questioned Frances. ‘Many a man who has committed far worse crimes is forgiven by his wife and allowed to see his family.’

‘I wish I could say,’ he murmured pathetically. ‘How could she have known me so little? Perhaps it was because the police thought that I had committed the crime; maybe to her mind that settled the matter. And I am afraid, very afraid, that she has convinced my children of the same.’

‘Did you learn anything of her circumstances after your arrest?’

‘No. Nothing at all.’ There was a damp glimmer in his eyes.

He looked so desperately unhappy that Frances almost sent for tea. She glanced at Sarah, who was watching their visitor carefully. If Sarah had suspected Sweetman of being a clever liar it would have shown in her face, but there was no trace of suspicion there. Could they accept his story after all?

‘Who was your solicitor?’ asked Frances.

‘Mr Manley. I think he is dead now.’

‘Yes, his junior Mr Rawsthorne took over the practice.’ Frances reflected that a great deal of the information she needed to help Mr Sweetman might well have gone into the grave during the intervening years. Rawsthorne, however, was her own family solicitor and a friend, and might be willing to offer some insights, or even have retained some documentation relating to the case. ‘Tell me about your family,’ she asked.

‘Susan is fifty years of age – three years younger than I,’ said Sweetman, his voice gentle with fond memories, ‘and she has not sought a legal separation from me, or I would surely have known of it. She was once Susan Porter, and her father was a clerk. We were married in October 1851, and there are two children: Benjamin, our eldest, will be twenty-eight now, and Mary twenty-six. I miss them so much – I –’ he was suddenly so overcome with emotion it choked in his throat, and he was briefly unable to speak. Frances offered him a glass of water, which he took, gratefully. ‘I am sorry, but this is such a grief to me. From the moment I was accused of that terrible crime, I have seen nothing of my wife and nothing of my children. Benjamin and Mary might be married by now – I might even be a grandfather! What a joy it would be to know that they are well and happy!’

‘How do you make your living now, Mr Sweetman?’ asked Frances with a stern edge to her voice.

He wiped his eyes, gave a wry smile and nodded. ‘Ah, I understand you. You are wondering if I want to find my family so that I can demand money from them, or live off them like a leech. No, I will make no demands; they have suffered so much that even though it is no fault of mine I do not think I have any claim on them. But just to see them, to know that they are in health and provided for, even if I cannot speak to them or make myself known, that will be sufficient. I work for my nephew Edward, my sister’s boy, as a clerk and general factotum. He is now a dental surgeon, and very successful. He believes in my innocence. He even thought to offer me lodgings in his home, but his wife – she has daughters by a previous marriage and not knowing me, she was nervous to have me in the house. I live simply, I need very little, and yes, with his assistance I can pay your fee.’

Sarah had stopped knitting and was staring at Frances very keenly. She was strongly aware of how much Frances wanted to find her own mother, whom she had not seen since she was three years old, and yet at the same time feared to find her, feared so much that she had not dared to look. Sometimes Frances felt certain that her mother wanted to see her, but that she too was afraid of a meeting. Perhaps her mother had read about her achievements in the newspapers, especially the
Bayswater
Chronicle
, which represented the intrepid lady detective as a towering champion of justice, or even in the halfpenny illustrated stories that were in wide circulation about the exploits of the daring ‘Miss Dauntless’, who, it could not be doubted, was intended to represent Frances. It would surely warm her mother’s heart to know that Frances was well and a success, but it might also deter her from confronting a daughter who she might believe would not want to know her. Frances often liked to imagine that ladies who passed her in the street with a polite greeting and a smile were her own parent. If that was the case, she must have a hundred of them.

‘I expect you have already tried to find your family,’ said Frances.

‘Oh, since I came out of prison last month I have thought of little else,’ said her client with some feeling. ‘I have spoken to everyone who might know where they are, but have learned nothing.’

‘Can you describe to me what you have done so far, and also let me have details of all Mrs Sweetman’s relatives and friends? I will need names and any addresses you can remember.’ Frances poised a freshly sharpened pencil over her notebook.

‘Of course, I will tell you everything I know. Unfortunately, Susan has no brothers or sisters living, and her parents were deceased long ago. My own dear sister died while I was in prison and left no message for me to suggest that she knew what had become of Susan and my children. My nephew, likewise, knows nothing. He was away at school when the catastrophe occurred. I went to our old home in Garway Road, but Susan was not there and the neighbours, all of whom were unknown to me as they had lived there under ten years, could tell me nothing. I have no way of finding our maid, Betty – I never even knew her surname. I went to the school that my children attended, but the building was gone – all knocked down and a furniture warehouse where it once stood, and I was told that the headmistress had retired to the country many years ago. I placed an advertisement in the newspaper but there was no reply. I thought then to go to the offices of J. Finn Insurance, as Susan did very occasionally come there when she had a message for me. The company is still in the same building, but old Mr Finn died some years ago, as did Mr Browne, and all the others I knew when I worked there have left. Gibson – well he was sixty-five at the time of the robbery and I was told that he was never well enough to come back to work, so he can scarcely be alive now. Of the other three clerks, Minster left to become a publican, and Elliott and Whibley went to join an accountancy firm, Anderson and Walsh. Anderson was Whibley’s uncle.’

‘Whibley?’ said Frances, startled at the familiar name. ‘Is that the Thomas Whibley who died recently?’

‘Yes, and that was rather upsetting because I went there and spoke to him only two days before he died.’

Frances paused to consider this unexpected development. She always entertained a suspicion of coincidences, but in the busy world of Bayswater finance it was perhaps not too surprising when two individuals were acquainted. There seemed to be no obvious connection between a fourteen-year-old robbery and the controversy surrounding the reasons for Mr Whibley’s recent death, but the opportunity to interview someone who had recently spoken to the deceased man was too good to miss. ‘Tell me about your visit to Mr Whibley,’ she requested.

‘I went to see him because out of all the people at J. Finn Insurance, only he and Mr Finn knew Susan at all well. We had sometimes dined together. I hoped he had heard from her or knew something of what she did after I was convicted, but he was unable to help me.’

‘Did he seem unwell to you?’ asked Frances. ‘I appreciate that you could not have been aware of any recent deterioration in his health, but in view of the allegations that have been made about him in the press I would value your observations.’

‘Oh, are you enquiring into that?’ he exclaimed. ‘The most terrible things have been said!’

‘I like to keep informed of all matters of current interest in Bayswater,’ replied Frances, evenly.

Sweetman nodded. ‘Of course. Well, I can tell you that I was very shocked by his appearance. He was always rather portly, but since I last saw him he had become enormously fat and looked quite aged, although he was not yet fifty. He did not look like a man destined to live long, although of course I could not have anticipated …’ he sighed.

‘So,’ said Frances, looking at her notes, ‘of the employees of J. Finn Insurance who might have known or heard about Mrs Sweetman; Mr Finn, Mr Whibley and Mr Browne are deceased, and in all probability Mr Gibson is too. Did Mr Browne have any family?’

‘No, he was a bachelor and lived alone.’

‘And was Mr Whibley able to tell you where the others were to be found?’

‘Yes, Minster is now the landlord of the Cooper’s Arms, a small beer house on the corner of Bott’s Mews, a very low establishment. He inherited some money and used it to start the business. I did try to see him, but he made it very plain that he thought I was a criminal and told me to leave. He was never a very pleasant individual and the years have not improved him.’

Frances raised her eyebrows. ‘Mr Minster inherited money? From whom, and how much?’

‘Yes,’ said Sweetman, ‘I had thought of that, too. Even at the time I wondered if it was he who stole the money. Whibley also suspected him, but I suppose Minster was able to account for his movements, for there was never any suggestion of his being arrested. I don’t know about the inheritance and Whibley couldn’t tell me any more, but it does appear that out of all the employees of the company Minster is the only man to have suddenly acquired any wealth shortly after the robbery. Elliott went to work for Anderson and Walsh as a clerk. Whibley started as a junior accountant and eventually became a partner. Later, when his uncle, Mr Anderson, died, he inherited the business. Elliott married the widow who was a great deal younger than Anderson and not only left well provided for, but is very beautiful so I am told. The only person at J. Finn Insurance I haven’t been able to find is the messenger boy, Timmy, but he was scarcely nine years old at the time.’

‘But, to clarify, you are not asking me to prove you innocent of the crime, or find the real thief or the stolen money,’ Frances established.

He looked surprised. ‘No, I can hardly think that would be possible, after so long.’

‘All the same,’ said Frances, ‘I imagine that if you were to find your family you would like to be able to offer them proof of your innocence.’

‘They are my family,’ said Sweetman, with some dignity, ‘not a jury. What proof should they need?’

Frances questioned him closely and made a note of the full names and last known addresses of everyone who she might need to interview, including the unfortunate clerk, Arthur Gibson, in the faint hope that he was still alive and had recovered a memory that could exonerate Mr Sweetman. ‘The two other men who had keys, the ones who had alibis for the robbery – who were they?’

‘Mr Finn, and Whibley,’ said Sweetman. ‘But really I can’t believe that either would have been capable of such a crime. Both of them I remember were horribly shocked by what happened.’

‘Do you have a portrait of your family?’ asked Frances.

He shook his head. ‘No, that is a great regret to me.’

‘Then I would like a description.’

He nodded, and a wistful smile spread across his features. ‘Susan is about the same height as myself, about five feet and seven inches, so a little above what is common for a woman, and very pretty with light brown hair. Benjamin resembles me; I think once grown he would be a little taller, and his hair is brown, as mine once was. Mary …’ he sighed, ‘such a pretty thing, the image of her mother, hair like spun gold.’

‘They were not portrayed in the illustrated papers at the time of the trial?’

‘No, and I was glad of it,’ Sweetman said with some feeling.

Frances was completing her notes when there was a loud rapping at the front door. She exchanged glances with Sarah, since the insistent quality of the knock had already told them whom they might expect to see very soon. Sarah rose and went to look out of the window. Their rooms were on the first floor and afforded a good view of who stood on the doorstep. It was not a feature that had especially recommended the apartment when Frances had first seen it, but since moving there it had proved to be very useful. Sarah gave a grunt. ‘Inspector Sharrock,’ she said, ‘and he’s got a constable with him.’