CHAPTER 16

A Father’s Lament

Holmes did not disappoint me.

As we waited at the entrance to the mews for the return of Peter Findlay, he confounded me by turning his back to the street, quickly applying a black moustache and donning gold-rimmed spectacles. A subtle adjustment to his hair, and the effect was complete. It was no longer Sherlock Holmes standing beside me!

At my puzzled look, he said, ‘Findlay is due home at any moment. We have business to discuss, but I don’t want him recognizing the man who nearly took him in Oxford Street. At least, not before we have him in our clutches. Look, there is our man now!’

The tall, muscular figure of the man known as Peter Findlay moved slowly down the street towards us. His posture reflected a kind of resolute despair. As he drew closer, I noticed the pale blue eyes I’d seen in Oxford Street and the scar over the right eyebrow that Holmes had described.

Just as Findlay was about to turn into the mews, Holmes stepped in front of him, blocking his way.

‘Peter Findlay!’ Holmes exclaimed with a broad smile.

The man paused. ‘’S’right. Do I know you?’ he said gruffly. Liverpool, I thought, or thereabouts.

‘I met you at Ferrar Shipping,’ said Holmes, a trace of Lancashire in his voice. I had not heard him speak with a northern accent before. ‘Someone told me to find you in the vicinity. I am in luck, and so, dear sir, are you! My name is Berenford Wallace, my company are shipbuilders out of Liverpool, and we are looking for some apprentice engineers. I have a proposition for you, sir. Are you familiar with the Liverpool shipping industry?’ Holmes was remarkably fast on his feet.

‘Indeed, I am, sir. I—I come from there.’

‘May I stand you a drink, with my colleague here, Mr Ames?’

That was an offer the man would not refuse.

At the Wellford Arms, a rough and dingy public house not two streets away, Holmes bought a round, then sat us down at a stained wooden table in a corner niche. He proceeded to order drink after drink, downing them each in single gulp, matching Peter Findlay glass for glass.

While I am a man who can normally stand a few drinks without effect, what transpired here was beyond my ability. I did not know until this moment that Holmes could hold his alcohol better than any man I’d seen in my life. It should not have surprised me. He was full of hidden talents.

Soon, they began trading maritime engineering stories and Holmes gave me the cue. ‘Mr Ames here can’t hold his liquor. Look, he’ll be asleep in a minute. Won’t you, Ames?’

I duly pretended to lapse into sleep with an occasional eye cracked to witness the following developments.

As the drinks continued to flow, Peter Findlay admitted he was less than eager to return home. At Holmes’s urging, the man poured out his life story. He had been born into middle-class comfort, had success in school, and had even been taken on as an engineering protégé by a noted designer of steamships. But then his good fortune ended.

When Findlay was sixteen, his father was killed in a freak accident on the docks. The family income dropped to zero. ‘We were on the streets in three months,’ he revealed. His mother became an alcoholic, seemingly overnight.

He was given charge of his younger siblings, but one brother was ‘not right in the head’ and caused the family undue strain, even as Peter Findlay was forced to take an exhausting, menial job. ‘The money was better, but not enough to support six people.’ Then the brother in question got into a drunken brawl, killed a man, and went to gaol.

Findlay, by then well into his cups, admitted that he had abandoned his family, leaving their plight to the next older sibling, and ran off and ‘married a beautiful young girl’. They moved to London, where he’d hoped to catch another engineering apprenticeship opportunity. My eye cracked open and I watched him as he sighed, looking off into the distant past. ‘But I had my Clarice. She had bewitched me.’

‘Women, they do that,’ said Holmes sympathetically. ‘You are still married?’

‘I am. She … she has had her problems, poor soul. And luck was not with us. I got a good job, lost it, and then, through a series of misfortunes, we were forced to the workhouse.’

‘But you are able to care for her now?’ asked Holmes.

‘I won’t abandon my family again,’ said Findlay defensively. ‘No, sir. Not ever. I could not live with it.’

‘My wife, too, had her problems, may she rest in peace,’ said Holmes.

‘She’s dead then?’

‘Laudanum,’ said Holmes. ‘Dangerous stuff, that.’

He was veering close to the edge here. I peeked again. I thought I discerned a slight suspicion dawning on Peter Findlay.

‘But your wife? At least she is still alive?’ said Holmes quickly.

Findlay nodded and swiftly wiped away a tear. He downed his fourth whisky and lapsed into a morose silence.

Holmes then matched Findlay’s tale with a concocted story of his own, weaving a fiction so convincing I wondered if parts of it were not true. He described falling in love with a fragile young woman who became pregnant with their child. He subsequently lost his job, and they were forced for a time into the workhouse. As I listened, I smiled inwardly at the many times he’d chided me for what he called embroidering the accounts of his cases.

At the mention of the workhouse, I heard a noise and cracked one eye to see Finley sit upright. ‘What happened to them?’ asked the man, suddenly animated. ‘Your wife and child?’

‘Look, Ames is awake now,’ said Holmes, and I sat up and rubbed my eyes sleepily. ‘Our child was taken from us, as they do,’ he continued.

‘As they do …’ said Findlay bitterly.

‘And my wife could not stand it. She ran away from the workhouse, and I never saw her again,’ said Holmes.

‘And the child?’

Here Holmes’s voice grew very soft. ‘That is the thing. I do not know. I just do not know.’

Peter Findlay’s face went dark and he finished his drink in a single gulp. His eyes filled with tears. ‘I was in the workhouse, and my wife gave birth to a child there. We called him Christopher. Born on Christmas Day. He had a birthmark on his neck in the shape of a star. The Star o’ Bethlehem, we called it.’

Holmes and I stayed silent. After a moment Findlay went on.

‘We lost our little boy. At least, I thought we did. They told us he’d died. My wife was fragile before we had our child, but Christopher’s death sent her over the edge. She thought it was her fault. Even though I was able to move us out of the workhouse, she … she … suffered, and she began to lose her faculties. But I found a way to help her.’

‘How?’ asked Holmes eagerly.

‘I saved a little from my pay each week. I put it away. Carefully, so she would not know. And then I set her up in business.’

‘What kind of business?’

‘Child minding. To heal her mind. If she could care for other infants, I thought, perhaps it may be her salvation.’

That is not, however, what Holmes and I had witnessed. Holmes said nothing, letting Findlay continue. Surely the man knew what was going on at his wife’s business? This could not have been what he intended.

Findley’s eyes wandered back and forth. Holmes called for another round. It arrived and our guest tossed his back and took a deep breath.

‘The business, has that helped her?’ Holmes asked gently.

There was a long pause in which Findlay seemed to turn inward, as if we and all around him had vanished and he was utterly alone with his thoughts.

At last, he looked up. ‘It is not … not working well. But I have another hope. There is another thing … no, I dare not say. But if I can succeed, I can pull my Clarice back from the brink.’ He paused, looking around himself suspiciously, then leaned forward to Holmes and whispered, ‘I have discovered that my boy is still alive. Clarice did not cause his death after all!’

‘How do you know?’

Peter Findley reached into his threadbare jacket and removed a tattered newspaper clipping. He spread it on the table before Holmes. I could see without examining it that it was the article detailing Mrs Huron’s trial and the ‘stolen orphans’.

There was a pause. Holmes nodded. ‘I might be able to help you,’ said he.

I could barely conceal my astonishment. Surely Holmes could not contemplate returning Jonathan back to the colossal wreckage of this father and mother? And yet that is precisely what the courts might do if we interfered.

‘You don’t know what I’m thinking,’ said Findlay.

Holmes smiled. ‘Ah, but I do.’ He peeled off his moustache and removed his glasses. He sat up, eyes clear and posture erect. His voice changed back to his own. ‘You are thinking of a new way to get little Christopher back from the Endicotts.’

Peter Findlay staggered to his feet, knocking the chair over backwards. ‘Who are you?’ he shouted, outrage cutting through the layers of alcohol. He squinted at Holmes, who sat calmly before him, now in his own persona. A slow realization came over the man. ‘I … I know you. You were in Oxford Street.’

‘That is correct,’ said Holmes. ‘Did you even consider for a moment the child’s safety as you planned to run through crowds on the ice like that, Mr. Findlay?’

Findlay wavered. ‘I … I had to escape. I had to—’

‘Sit down. This does not excuse you. I am sympathetic to your desire to help your wife, but your violence weighs against you.’

‘Who are you?’

‘Do as I say, or you will be in gaol before the hour is out. Sit!’

The man reluctantly took his seat again.

‘Now, listen to me. My name is Sherlock Holmes. I am a private individual but closely affiliated with the law. I will help you, but only if you cooperate.’

‘Help me? How?’

‘There are conditions. The first is that you must close down your wife’s business. She is endangering the babies under her care. I am sure you are aware of this.’

‘But I hired her a helper. Clarice will improve, I know she will.’

‘She will not without help. Today must be the last day of operation. Close Baby Village tonight, or I will see your wife in prison.’

‘You don’t understand. Christopher is our child. On Oxford Street, I saw the star, the star on his neck. Christopher! He is our child!’

‘And you would take this child back? You are struggling to keep your current position. Alcohol has you in its grip. Your wife is addicted to laudanum.’

‘We can do better. We can—’

‘Look at yourself, man. Even if you prove your parentage, the courts will rule against you.’

But we could not be sure of that, I thought.

Findlay dissolved into tears. Despite his violence, his story was tragic, and I felt some degree of sympathy for the man. His bad fortune was not his fault. He was truly a victim of circumstance, providing he was telling the truth. Instinct told me that he was.

Holmes pulled out his notebook and from it removed a paper and a business card.

‘I ought to have you arrested, Peter Findlay,’ said he. ‘Go home now. As soon as all the babies have been collected by their mothers, close up Baby Village, remove the sign from the window and never take in another child … ever.’

‘My wife! Clarice will go mad.’

‘Better that than other people’s children die through your wife’s negligence. Replace the sign with a new one announcing it is closed, then you must both pack up your belongings tonight and go to this address. Ask for Agnes. She will tell you what to do. You must complete all this by dawn, or the offer is off, and I’ll see you both go to gaol.’

‘But what of the poor mothers who leave their children? They rely on us.’

‘Focus on your own problems. If you do not shut down this business, a child will die at your wife’s hands. As little Christopher nearly did.’

‘What do you mean? She would never harm our child.’

‘Perhaps not intentionally. But the prison matron did find your Christopher lying on the cold cement floor next to your wife, who was insensible from opium. Claudine Huron rescued your son from near death. And she made sure it would never happen again.’

The look on Peter Findlay’s face told us everything. Holmes had spoken the truth and the man knew it.

‘Have you never loved a child?’ cried Findlay between sobs. ‘Our lives have been a living hell. Not a day goes by that we don’t mourn Christopher. And then when I found out where he was … Well, what would you have done?’

‘Not what you did.’ Holmes’s face hardened. ‘You are a criminal. You knocked a woman down in the street. You broke into a home. You struck a man. You struck me, earlier. You threw a pot of boiling water at a young maid! And you attempted to abduct a young child from the only home he has known. Imagine the boy’s terror, his distress.’

‘The last thing I wish is to harm my little boy.’

‘That is not good enough, Mr Findlay. I have sympathy for your longing, but none at all for your actions. I have anticipated your story, or much of it, and I have arranged help for you and Mrs Findlay.’

‘Help?’

Holmes tapped the piece of paper he had set in front of Findlay.

‘On this paper is an address. Be there by dawn. I will know whether or not you comply. And I reiterate—fail to do this and you will both be incarcerated. With what this gentleman and I saw today of your wife’s conduct, she will not be free in a very long time. Make your choice.’

He handed the slip of paper to Peter Findlay.

‘Now, go.’

In a hansom cab a few minutes later, I turned to see my friend lost in dark thoughts.

‘I presume that you have set into motion some kind of plan, Holmes. May I know what it is?’

‘Presume nothing, Watson. Presumptions lead to gross error.’

‘But what have you done? Where have you sent the Findlays?’

Holmes closed his eyes. ‘I am very tired, Watson. I have sent them to a place of last resort. This morning I made all the arrangements. In order for my plan to work, many things … so many things must … Oh, let it go, Watson. I need to think.’

He closed his eyes and would say no more.