a welter of confusion exists on both sides of the river,” I said. “It is packed with wharves, warehouses, and docks all the way to Greenwich and beyond. There are ships of every kind docked, or anchored, or arriving, or departing, or moving from one place to another. It is difficult to make any sense of it.”
There was laughter in her voice. “Spoken like a true landlubber. Successful thieves have the ability to turn such confusion to their advantage. That is why they are successful. What are their chances of being overlooked if they boldly move goods through that clutter of shipping by daylight?”
“None,” I said confidently. “They might manage it once or twice, but they would be caught sooner or later and probably sooner. The police and customs authorities keep a closer watch on things than seems possible.”
“In any case, the actual stealing would have to be done at night when there are few people about,” Lady Sara mused. “The first question is whether the stolen goods are being removed by waggon or by boat.”
I had no answer to that, but I felt certain of one thing: If by boat, they weren’t being transported far. “When boats move on the river at night, someone knows all about them or quickly becomes suspicious,” I said. “They couldn’t navigate through London’s harbour night after night in unlighted boats of whatever description without both police and customs authorities investigating. Even if the boats are properly lighted, someone will soon get curious as to who they are and where they are going. They aren’t transporting stolen goods from Tilbury to somewhere beyond the upper pool, for example.”
“All the thefts to date have occurred between London Bridge and Greenwich,” Lady Sara said. “The thieves probably have a haven somewhere along those reaches. Or several havens. Even so, it seems strange that the authorities have never caught sight of them. Chief Inspector Mewer considers this a simple case. ‘One not worthy of Lady Sara’s attention,’ was the way he put it to a subordinate. He regards the thieves’ success as a question of luck, but he has to concede they have been uncommonly lucky.”
“There has to be more than luck involved,” I said.
“A great deal more. The thefts have been managed so cleverly that the firms robbed haven’t been able to decide when or what time of day it happened or what employees were on duty. That suggests an organization of highly skilled thieves. But to return to the waggon or boat question—however the thefts are managed, almost certainly the goods are being taken somewhere quickly by boat.”
“Why not by land?” I asked, remembering those sharp-eyed police on the river.
“Think how many waggons it would require, or how many trips by one waggon, to transport the quantity of goods stolen. That would attract far more attention around the looted warehouses than a single unlighted boat. I am certain the thefts occur at night with the goods being removed by boat to a warehouse or warehouses along the river.”
I thought for a moment about what I had seen from the river. “If the thieves were to use a boat small enough to nose into narrow openings, they could move closely inshore and keep out of sight by threading their way among anchored or docked ships. That might enable them to escape detection indefinitely.”
Lady Sara shook her head. “The boat would have to be large enough to carry worthwhile loads. Also, a boat behaving in the manner you describe would arouse suspicion the moment anyone glimpsed it. The thieves may find boldness more effective than stealth because it isn’t so likely to be suspected. They may keep to the centre of the river and follow in the wake of a large boat. Or they may work up one side and then drift back downstream on the other side. They may change their tactics repeatedly.”
The idea of a small boat hiding in shadows along the shore appealed to me, and I was reluctant to give it up. “Sentries posted on the bank could detect them easily if they really are moving close inshore,” I said.
“But we don’t want them ‘detected,’” Lady Sara said. “Capturing one boat wouldn’t solve anything. They would simply change their tactics. We must find out where they are taking the stolen goods. Their warehouse, or warehouses, will have to be our first objective. These may belong to a firm handling a large volume of legitimate business. Only in that way could quantities of stolen goods be disposed of without eventually arousing suspicion. We also need to know something about the way goods are handled along the river. When you can spare the time, give some thought to that.”
CHAPTER 4
The meeting with Chief Inspector Mewer was scheduled for two o’clock, and Thomas Tallmage, the doctor who, years before, had reduced a mongrel dog’s fracture for me, arrived shortly before two. He was now Sir Thomas Tallmage, one of London’s most distinguished physicians. He was tall and handsome, greying despite the fact that he wasn’t much older than fifty, the calm and poised master of any crisis because he had seen so many. He had been Lady Sara’s suitor for more than twenty years.
He once told me how, as a young doctor, he had attempted to persuade her father, the Earl, that his prospects, both for wealth and distinction, were excellent, and he would make a worthy husband for a nobleman’s daughter. The Earl cut him off with a laugh. “You don’t have to convince me, my boy. Convince her!”
Sir Thomas had never been able to, but he was still trying.
Lady Sara was her father’s favourite child. He would have left the peerage to her if the law had permitted it. He often announced, pridefully, that she did everything he could do, and did it better, except chase women. When she came of age, the Married Woman’s Property Act had not yet been passed, and a husband had absolute control over a wife’s money and property. Lady Sara told her father she wanted no man meddling with her patrimony. He decided he didn’t, either, and he settled a generous life income on her in such a way that her husband, if she acquired one, would be unable to touch the principal or even the income.
“The day before that happened, I had about four hundred suitors,” Lady Sara remembered with a laugh. “The day afterward, the number had dropped to four.”
She had nothing against marriage. She thought it a splendid institution for a man but not for a woman. Lord Byron had written, “Man’s love is of man’s life a thing apart,/’Tis woman’s whole existence.” To Lady Sara’s extreme irritation, men were fond of quoting this to her, and she liked to point out acidly that they always quoted it out of context. Lord Byron’s lines were not for her.
There was so much she wanted to do with her life, so much to learn, so many things to accomplish, and when she looked critically at the lives of her women friends, she saw that marriage had all but consumed every one of them. Marriage left a woman little time for anything else. Even women of her own class, with no financial worries and houses full of servants, had to supervise constantly; dismiss inept maids and fight daily battles with housekeepers and butlers; conduct their own employment bureau so as to always have a full staff available; plan elaborate social occasions; struggle heroically with catastrophe when, with a dinner party in the offing, a cook or butler or housekeeper left without notice; look after their children’s welfare and education; work unremittingly to make certain their homes were efficiently and peacefully and economically run. To what purpose? So their husbands could be freed from all domestic concerns in order to occupy themselves with more important matters. Lady Sara chose to remain single and invest her large income in the work that was her vocation, her profession, and—yes—her religion, the detection of crime.
When I joined Lady Sara and Sir Thomas, they were already seated at the oaken conference table in her study. In the centre was the enormous cribbage board Lady Sara inherited from her father. At the moment there were only two sets of pegs on the board. One represented our investigation into the river thefts. Those pegs
