“I am inclined to agree with you,” I said.
“This I will take.” Thompson waved at the carbine. “Will you pack the pieces up for me, Mr. Brewster? I’ll present it to the magistrate and see what he makes of it.”
Brewster set the carbine back into the bag without argument. “Guns are fiddly things,” he said as he climbed to his feet and handed the canvas sack to Thompson. “There as like to blow your fingers off as hit your target. Knife or a cosh, much easier.”
“There is something to what you say,” I told him. In the cavalry, I’d carried a carbine, but I’d preferred my calvary sword and the skill of my horse to shooting. The accuracy of the weapons had not been laudable.
We’d found nothing in the baggage or among the clothing, or indeed the carbine, to tell us whether Mr. Warrilow had family or friends in England, or even Antigua. A wedding band spoke of marriage, but Eden had not mentioned that Warrilow had a wife. A married man usually wore his wedding ring, but a widower might carry it in his pocket, or put it under the floorboards for safekeeping.
When Warrilow’s death was reported in the newspapers, with his name, family, if he had any, would surely come forward. Solicitors would need to locate his heirs in any case.
We left the room and went downstairs, Thompson with the carbine in its bag, into which he’d also placed the watch, ring, and coins. Mrs. Beadle waited for us at the foot of the staircase.
“Will this be the last time anyone searches that room?” she asked Thompson. “I have a boarding house to run.”
“I will tell them to stay away,” Thompson assured her. I doubted there’d be anything left to find. I trusted Brewster’s thoroughness. “If no one comes forward, you are welcome to sell the clothes.”
“Thank you.” She brightened. “Can get a nice price for decent garb. Good day to you, gents.”
I tipped my hat to Mrs. Beadle and followed Thompson and Brewster out into the road.
Traffic filled the street, carts bringing deliveries to the gin houses and taverns, women with baskets over their arms perusing the shops, men walking purposefully on whatever business they were attending. A few sailors lingered, probably waiting for the gin houses to open, assessing the streets for later revelry.
As we were on the north side of the square, we walked through a narrow lane to emerge on Cable Street. From there we went east and south again toward Wapping Docks.
I turned to the other question I wanted to ask Thompson as we walked. “I heard an amount of cargo was stolen from the ship Eden and Warrilow traveled on. The Dusty Rose. Perhaps that was a motive for Warrilow’s murder—he might have seen the thieves or known who they were.”
Thompson swung one thin arm, the other burdened with the sack. His coat looked in danger of sliding from his shoulders at any time, but remarkably, it never did.
“It hasn’t been the only theft.” His usually good-natured expression creased into a frown. “It’s buggering me something fierce. Cargos are being robbed, half gone by the time they reach the warehouses. Only part—never all of it. Some ships are only missing a few things, but I’m damned if I know how the thieves are doing it. When the ships come in, the cargo masters check the manifests, and all is well. The laborers are watched carefully as they unload and put the goods into carts to be trundled to the warehouse. When the cargo reaches the warehouse, usually all appears to be well again. But—when the goods are to be packed up and shipped to whoever ordered them, they’ve vanished.”
“You said usually all appears to be well.”
Thompson scratched his head under his battered hat. “Sometimes an entire cart never turns up at the warehouse. A search is put out but cart, horse, and driver are gone.”
“Someone pays the driver to take the cart elsewhere,” Brewster suggested.
“Presumably,” Thompson said. “But the driver is never seen again. Even if the drivers are innocent victims of robbery, they make themselves scarce, probably fearing they’ll be held responsible for thousands of pounds of goods.”
“Or the poor buggers are killed,” Brewster said.
“I believe we’d find more bodies turning up, if that were the case. Plus we never find the horses or carts again either.” Thompson shook his head. “Most of the time, as I say, the goods reach the warehouses. The warehouses are well guarded, and there is never a sign of a break-in. But again, when the time comes for those goods to be moved on, they’re gone, as though they never existed. I have men stationed to watch houses where we know stolen goods are traded, but they have nothing to report. It is a true mystery.”
“There is a man who lives not a stone’s throw from the wharves that deals in that sort of thing,” I said. “Name of Creasey. From what I understand, he’s a thief and a smuggler.”
Thompson gave me a wise nod. “Thief, smuggler, murderer, dealer in stolen goods … I know all about him, Captain. I have eyes on him, but he hasn’t lifted a finger in months.”
“James Denis claims he’s responsible for stolen merchandise,” I said. “Denis’s network is thorough.”
Brewster snorted. “Aye, I’d say it is.”
“Would that I could have a quarter hour to ask Mr. Denis all about it,” Thompson said with a meditative glance at the warehouses around us. “What has he told you, Captain?”
“Very little. Only that Creasey is extremely dangerous.”
“I know that as well.” Thompson sighed. “I have no evidence on him, unfortunately. If I did, I’d be making many arrests and laughing as loudly as your Runner, Pomeroy.”
“If I discover anything more about him from Mr. Denis, I will tell you,” I promised.
“Thank you.” Thompson gave me a brief smile then sobered. “I would stay clear of Mr. Creasey, Captain. He dislikes anyone poking in his business, and those who do often end up in the river.”
“That’s what I tell ’im,” Brewster said. “Not that he’ll listen.”
“I’m not as heedless as all that,” I said. “I have met Mr. Creasey, and I am not in a hurry to face him again. He’s a cold, hard man. I’ll not go poking him, as you say.”
I discerned by Brewster’s and Thompson’s expressions that neither man believed me.
BEFORE I LEFT Thompson at the Wapping Docks, I asked to look at the carbine once again. Thompson relinquished it to me, and I studied the pieces of the gun on a table in a dim room inside the River Police quarters, with Brewster hovering beside me.
“It’s fairly new.” I brought up the barrel and sighted down it. “It’s rifled, as you can see.” I peered inside the metal barrel at the spiral grooves. “In very good condition.”
“Warrilow was a small planter?” Brewster asked. “Maybe he kept it to keep birds off his land. Or his laborers frightened into working harder.”
“A farmer would carry a different sort of gun,” I said. “This is a military weapon. It makes me wonder very much indeed where he obtained it.”
Thompson cocked his head. “He bought it from a former military man, perhaps?”
“Possibly. Antigua is British. The many forts there are used to fend off attacks on the fortified harbors. Lord Nelson himself had a naval command there. The army forts could have sold off surplus weapons, but I somehow doubt that.”