Chapter 5
1812 Words
Lantern light cast flickering shadows across the deck of Lady of Blackness as Watters stepped onto the weather-stained planking. "What"s to do?"
Lady of Blackness"There"s a blasted body in my hold; that"s what"s to do." The man looked as battered as his ship, with his nose broken and twisted to starboard. The white line of an old scar crossed his barely shaven jaw.
"And who might you be?" Watters asked.
"I might be anybody, but I am Captain Murdo Stevenson. This is my ship."
"Show us the body please, Captain Stevenson." Superintendent Mackay did not waste time.
"It"s in the hold," Captain Stevenson said. "Or rather, it"s all over the b****y hold. Follow me, gentlemen." Leading them to a length of knotted rope that stretched from an open hatch to the dark depths below, Stevenson raised his voice to a bellow. "Bring me two lanterns!"
Without waiting for the light to arrive, Stevenson swarmed down the rope.
"I"ll go next." Mackay followed with barely less skill than Stevenson had shown. Watters descended last, plunging into a darkness that was relieved when a saturnine seaman lowered a pair of lanterns.
"Here"s the body." Captain Stevenson led them to the furthest corner of the hold, where the bouncing light of the lanterns scared away scurrying rats. "What"s left of it after four months at sea." He pointed downward at the smeared remnants of a man.
"He"s been flattened." Watters looked down at the corpse. "It looks like every bone in his body had been broken. What happened?"
Captain Stevenson grunted. "Ask his maker for I"m blessed if I know. We found him here, squashed beneath hundreds of bales of raw jute."
"I see." Watters looked around. "So we don"t know if the jute killed him or if he was already dead when the weight of the cargo crushed him."
Superintendent Mackay nodded. "Exactly so. This might be murder or a simple accident. I"ll leave you to it, Watters. Give me a report of your findings. Don"t waste too much time over it."
"Yes, sir." Watters looked upward as Mackay swarmed up the rope. "Could you arrange for the body to be taken ashore? I"d like the surgeon to have a look at him."
"I know the procedure, Sergeant," Mackay spoke over his shoulder. "And Watters, don"t forget that you are on volunteer duty tomorrow afternoon."
"No, sir, I won"t forget." Watters restrained his oath. He had no enthusiasm for his position as a sergeant in the Eastern Division of Dundee Volunteers, which was a further encroachment into his time. However, with the current apprehension that the French might flex their military muscle at Britain"s expense, Watters knew it was his duty to don the Queen"s scarlet. Besides which, as his wife Marie reminded him, the money came in handy.
"Has the body been moved, Captain Stevenson?"
"No, Sergeant. It"s exactly where we found it."
"I see." Watters knelt at the side of the corpse. "Do you have this unfortunate fellow"s name, Captain? Was he a member of your crew?"
"I don"t know who he might be," Stevenson said. "He was not one of my men."
With the dead man"s pockets stuck together with dried blood, Watters had to cut his way in to prise them apart. He questioned Stevenson as he worked. "Is it normal for strangers to roam around your ship when she"s in dock, Captain?"
"It is not. I have a ship"s husband who should prevent any strangers from boarding." Stevenson did not sound pleased, but whether at the questions or the disruption to his routine that the body caused, Watters was not sure.
"Is your ship"s husband still on board?" Watters slipped his hand inside the dead man"s trouser pockets. They were empty.
"He lives on board," Stevenson said.
"I"ll speak to him in a few moments." Watters checked the inside of the dead man"s jacket. Also empty. "How many of a crew do you have?"
"Twenty-four." Stevenson was abrupt. "Do you want to speak to them all?"
"Yes, I do. Are they all on board?"
"No." Stevenson shook his head. "My lads are either at home, drinking away their wages along Dock Street, or with some bobtail in Couttie"s Wynd."
Watters felt along the waistband of the dead man"s trousers. There was no money belt or anything else. "What is the makeup of your crew? Where are they from?"
Captain Stevenson was evidently annoyed by all of the questions. "It"s a typical south-Spain crew. As well as my Dundonians I have the usual Scowegians, Lascars, North Sea c******n, and a couple of Americans avoiding their country"s troubles."
"I want their home addresses," Watters said.
"You"ll have to ask the owners about that," Stevenson said, "or the boarding master for I"m blessed if I know."
Watters grunted again. He should have known it would not be easy.
"Who are the owners?"
"Matthew Beaumont and Company," Captain Stevenson said. "It"s a wholly owned Beaumont ship."
"Oh?" Watters looked up. That was two incidents concerning the same company in one day. He did not believe in coincidences. "Thank you, Captain. I"ll have a look around the hold. When I come on deck, please have the ship"s husband ready for me."
"There"s nothing to see down here," Stevenson said.
"I want to know why this poor fellow was here in the first place," Watters said. "And I want to know if the cargo was lowered on him while he was sleeping or if he was already dead when the cargo was loaded."
Stevenson nodded. "If you let me know when you"re finished, I"ll fetch the husband and any other of the crew who may turn up."
Watters lifted the lantern and examined the body. In all the score or so of investigations into suspicious deaths in which he had been involved, the cause of death had been apparent. In this case, bales of jute had crushed the man so that Watters found it impossible to tell if the injuries had been caused before or after death.
"I hope the surgeon can see something I can"t see." He looked at the neck and throat for signs of a knife wound and checked the shirt for the same. "No, it"s up to the surgeon now. Now, my unfortunate fellow, why on earth were you down here?"
Leaving the body where it lay, Watters lifted the lantern and paced around the hold talking to himself. You"ve no money. Were you an unlucky stowaway? Your clothes are good quality, too good for a tarry-jack; are you a gentleman down on his luck?
You"ve no money. Were you an unlucky stowaway? Your clothes are good quality, too good for a tarry-jack; are you a gentleman down on his luck?All the time Watters spoke, he was investigating the hold, looking for anything unusual. He stopped and sniffed at a familiar acrid smell. What"s this? Crouching down, he rubbed his hand along the rough planking of the deck, feeling the coarse grains under his fingers.
What"s this?Watters pursed his lips. I see. He scooped up a pinch of the grains and folded them inside his handkerchief. I see, but I don"t understand. Lifting the lantern, he carried it carefully to the centre of the hold before taking out his notebook and pencil. After writing a few notes, he returned to his scrutiny of the hold, eventually lifting a couple of items. He examined them before putting them in his pocket. There is more to this case than a drunken man falling into the hold or a brawl gone too far. We have something of interest here.
I seeI see, but I don"t understandThere is more to this case than a drunken man falling into the hold or a brawl gone too far. We have something of interest here."I"m coming up, Captain!"
Captain Stevenson stood at the break of the poop with a surprisingly elderly man at his side.
"You"ll be the ship"s husband," Watters said.
The elderly man nodded. "That"s right, sir." His voice was hoarse.
Watters poised his pencil. "I"m not a sir. I am Sergeant Watters of the Dundee Police. What is your name?"
"James Thoms, sir, but everybody calls me Piper."
"Right, Piper, tell me about that body in the hold."
"I don"t know anything about it, sir, not until we unloaded the cargo and found it." Piper"s hands fiddled with the ends of his coarse canvas shirt.
"Where was the vessel loaded, Piper?"
"Calcutta, sir."
"Call me Sergeant. Who was in charge of the loading?"
"Mr Henderson, sir, the mate."
That made sense. The master was in overall command, decided on the course and made the big decisions, while the mate was in charge of the day-to-day running of the vessel. "I"ll speak to Mr Henderson later. Did you see anybody come on board this vessel when you were in Calcutta?"
"No, sir. Nobody came aboard except the crew and the dock workers who loaded the cargo."
"Sergeant, not sir. Do you think the deceased was one of the dockers?"
"No, sir, Sergeant." Beads of sweat formed on Piper"s forehead. "The dock workers were all Lascars, sir. That is natives of Hindustan."
"Of course," Watters nodded. "You could not watch everything all the time."
"No, sir." Piper looked guilty as if Watters expected him to remain awake and alert twenty-four hours a day. The nervous sweat was dripping from his face.
"Did you delegate anybody to take over when you were off duty?"
Piper nodded vigorously. "Mr Henderson took over, sir." He looked pleased to pass the responsibility to the mate.
"Did you check the hold before the loading began?"
"No, sir. There was no need." Piper glanced at Captain Stevenson as if to confirm his words. "Nobody ever goes down there."
Watters wrote in his notebook. "Thank you, Mr Thoms, and thank you, Captain Stevenson. I"ll leave you in peace now. If you can think of anything, please let me know. Send a note to the Police Office on West Bell Street." Watters checked his watch. Marie would be wondering where he had got to.
As he walked out of the dock, past the Royal Arch, Watters saw the woman silhouetted against the bright glow of a gin palace window. Henrietta Borg was in animated conversation with a man in a bowler hat with a feather thrust through the band.
"Miss Borg!" Watters lifted his cane in salutation and hurried forward. A boisterous crowd of seamen and prostitutes exploded from the public house around Borg, and then she was gone. Had she been watching Lady of Blackness? Had she been watching him? Or was her presence here merely another of these coincidences in which Watters did not believe? Swinging his cane at an imaginary golf ball, Watters thought that this case might be interesting.
Lady of Blackness
- Writer
