When Tennant and O’Malley got off the omnibus, the signs and scents of the nearby river surrounded them. Herring gulls wheeled across the sky, gliding low, drifting below the roof-lines, calling out with mewing wails. They turned a corner and came face-to-face with the brick ramparts guarding the perimeter of Poplar’s East India Docks. The smells of tar, tobacco, and the spices of the East—cinnamon and cloves—scented the air.
They passed the entrance just as a steam whistle shrieked. A foreman with a face like cracked leather and a sandpaper voice rasped out names from a muster book. Coins changed hands, and the laborers trudged out the gate.
“Backbreaking labor at fourpence an hour,” O’Malley grumbled as they walked past.
“Not work for the faint of heart or shoulder.”
“Up with the sun tomorrow, they’ll be. Waving and shouting their names at the calling foreman, hoping to get on his list to work another day.”
Tennant glanced at O’Malley, taking in his broad-shouldered bulk. “Did you ever work the docks, Paddy?”
“My dad shifted coal on Dublin’s quays until the work gave out. He was a wreck of a man in the end. Sure, they’ll work a fella to death if they can, these shippers. No, I made my way in the boxing ring before the Yard took me on.” O’Malley flexed his gloved fingers in the cold.
The inspector remembered the broken knuckles on his sergeant’s hands. Tennant had his own old injuries and shifted his weight from an aching leg. “Where’s that address, Paddy?”
“There.”
They crossed Barking Road and stopped at a corner building. It housed a busy pub, and next to it, a fading sign readMILLER AND SON, COOPERS. Tennant fitted the key he’d taken from its owner, and the door swung in.
Bins lined the back from wall to wall. Four half-trussed kegs waited, their flayed staves spreading like flower petals. Oddly, someone had stacked about thirty wooden chairs against the right-hand wall.
After a look around, Tennant said, “Nothing here.” He opened the door to the living quarters in the back. They started with the smaller bedroom, Micah’s chamber.
Tennant said, “Let’s see what’s under his bed.”
“My knees are killing me.” O’Malley lowered himself to the floor. “But rank has its privileges.”
The sergeant dragged a battered suitcase from under the bed, unstrapped the lid, and pulled out a smudged, unsealed envelope, dumping it on the bed. He added dog-eared copies of theIllustrated London News, several sketches, and two books to the pile.
Tennant opened the envelope and shuffled through the contents. He handed it to O’Malley.
The sergeant gave a low whistle. “The naughty boy-o. What they call French postcards. Not the sort you’d send to your mam.”
“What’s in those sketches, Paddy?”
O’Malley thumbed through a set of charcoal drawings and handed them to Tennant.
“Well, well,” Tennant said, turning them over. “Mary Allingham’s missing drawings from the studio break-in. She signed them with her initials.”
“That nails young Micah to the wall. And what’s this? Pictures of Margot Miller, naked as the day she was born. Mother of God, the creature is keeping his sister under his bed with his stash of naughty postcards.”
“And those books?”
“A copy of the ladies’ exhibition catalog, with Margot Miller on the front. And a book calledThe New Sprees of London.” O’Malley flipped through the pages. “’Tis a guide to the city’s bawdy houses.”
“Keep Mary’s sketches and the catalog,” Tennant said. “Return the other items to the box. We’re done here.”
They returned to the workshop’s main room and found their entry had drawn attention. A man in a barman’s apron slouched against the doorframe. His face was as rough and wrinkled as a walnut, and he’d pushed up his shirtsleeves, revealing bulging arms covered with nautical tattoos.
“Alf Bailey,” he said. “Owner of the East Indiaman next door. The finest pub in Poplar.”
Tennant identified himself and Sergeant O’Malley as Metropolitan Police officers and asked about the Millers.
“Old Josiah’s gone barmy over religion. Mind you, the cooperage is still a going concern—the docks eat barrels for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Still, there’s more yammering and less hammering nowadays.”
“Meaning?”
“Every Sunday morning and Wednesday night, the blighter clears out his workshop and fills it with God-botherers, preaching and hymning all day and evening long.”
