Mystery in Moon Lane. A. A. Glynn
a particular desire to know what equipment he is building and using.”
“But I’m no specialist in matters scientific,” I pointed out.
“It will be chiefly a matter of observation on your part, Mr. Dacers—well within your powers,” said Duclois. “My wretched rival Amos Chaffin; this snake in the grass, as you English say, has dogged me for years with his ridicule. He tried to make me a laughing stock at the Berlin Congress of Science in 1850, then went to ground here in London, going into obscurity to work on a scheme, the very basis of which I know he stole from me. He doesn’t know that I have followed him, and am aware of where he is lurking. I must know more, however, but dare not show myself to him.”
“Where might he be found?” I asked.
“Not far from here. He has established a workshop in a portion of an old warehouse in Moon Lane where he is working alone. Do you know Moon Lane?”
I nodded, flinching inwardly. It was dangerously close to the sprawling St. Giles slum, known to the criminal classes as ‘The Holy Land’. Gangs of thieves and violent malefactors of every stripe inhabited it, clustering together in gangs to resist the forces of the law. Whenever the Peelers ventured there, they went in squads, often armed with cutlasses and sometimes pistols. However, the hefty fee promised by Monsieur Duclois was a powerful inducement.
“How will I know him?”
“Easily—a short, squat fellow, sharp-nosed and pockmarked. Oh, and he has a ridiculous set of false teeth which always seem to be in danger off falling out.”
“And what must I particularly note about Mr. Chaffin’s activities?” I enquired.
“Particularly what materials are delivered to his place of experiment and in what quantity,” Duclois said. “There will doubtless be carboys of acid and jars of distilled water and, very likely, sheets of slate. The scale of such deliveries will give me some idea of the scale of his experiments.”
“Merely that?” I asked.
“Not entirely. I suppose it will not be beyond your wit to enter his workshop, and I greatly desire a sketch of what he is building there—the roughest sketch will do so long as you can indicate the size of whatever he has set up. Have you ever seen an electrical battery?”
“Yes, at the Great Exhibition in ’51.”
“Well, I expect you’ll see something of the kind at Chaffin’s lair, but probably on a very large scale, but I want to be sure. I must steal a march on the rogue—to pay him out for filching the foundations of my own plans, as I know he has. I want to forestall him in giving the world one of the most astonishing achievements known to science and to trounce him once and for all.” Duclois was gesticulating again. And his eyes were glittering with near fanaticism.
“You have three days, Mr. Dacers. I shall be back then to discover your results. I shall not tell you where I am staying, for it is essential that I remain as scarce as Chaffin himself while I’m in London.”
He fished inside his surcoat and produced a large purse from which he took a handful of gold sovereigns and silver. He counted out ten guineas and placed the money in my hand. “And the rest on successful completion of the matter,” he said.
* * * *
At once, I settled my back rent, which considerably sweetened Mrs. Slingsby’s disposition and removed the threat of the debtors’ prison. Next morning, I set about my commission, choosing the right moment to leave the house. It being Tuesday, Mrs. Slingsby sent her girl slavey out to the market as usual, then departed on her regular weekly visit to her sister, so I was alone in the house. I put on rough boots, moleskin trousers, a coarse jacket, and a stove-in hat such as a workingman might wear, a costume suited to an excursion in the region of The Holy Land. I applied a scrubby set of whiskers and false moustaches, put a small notebook and a blacklead pencil into my pocket, and went forth. I left the house by the rear door and, after walking the back lanes of several streets, I emerged in the region of Oxford Street.
The air was balmy and the odors of the streets were only too evident. In the better-class thoroughfares, workmen were spreading quicklime in the gutters, following the usual precaution in the cholera season. I walked along Oxford Street, heading for the vicinity of St. Giles, trying to think up some stratagem for entering the Moon Lane warehouse.
Midway along Oxford Street, I passed a workman, shoveling quicklime and hoarsely croaking a song that was all the rage that year of 1855:
“Not long ago, in Vestminster,
There lived a ratcatcher’s daughter;
But she din’t quite live in Vestminster,
For she lived t’other side of the vater.…”
Ratcatcher! I thought to myself, Now, that’s the kind of man who might find employment in the region of Moon Lane. I also took note of the raffish singer’s Cockney idiom as a pointer to character.
Moon Lane was every bit as unprepossessing as it ever was. It was a narrow, snaking crack between old, gray, frowning warehouse buildings, most of which seemed to be empty. Its slimy cobbles were broken and there was a liberal scattering of puddles of filth underfoot. No human life was in evidence at first. Then, just as I entered the lane, a heavy cart drawn by two horses trundled out of a yard set to one side of one of the buildings. The driver was a surly-looking fellow, smoking a clay pipe and with a dirty sack as a cloak. I had to squeeze hard against a cracked wall to allow the animals and the vehicle to pass me. The carter considered me with a beery eye.
“Vot cheer, mate?” he growled as he passed, which encouraged me to believe my disguise was convincing.
“Vot cheer?” I replied. “Votcher been deliverin’—best ale and porter?”
“My eye! Nuffin’ so bloomin’ prime as that, vorse luck,” he called over his shoulder. “Four carboys of bloomin’ acid. Fine bloomin’ boozin’ that’d make!”
As the cart rumbled past, I took note of the legend on its side: ‘Alfred Musprat and Sons, Suppliers of chemicals and acids, Cheapside.’
Four carboys of acid. This was a good start, and this yard was obviously attached to the building, which Amos Chaffin had made his base of operations. I stood at the gate of the yard and surveyed it. Like everything about Moon Lane, it was gloomy and mean. Surrounded on three sides by the flaking walls of neighboring warehouses, it was cluttered with rubbish. The doors of the surrounding buildings were closed and some were boarded up. One, however, stood open, the only sign of there being any kind of activity in the place. I could see four carboys lined up just inside the doorway
I ventured into the yard and looked about cautiously. It was quiet with no sign of life. Cautiously, I walked towards the open door and entered a damp and musty windowless corridor shrouded in gloom. Again, there was no sign of anyone, but the carboys of acid deposited on the threshold suggested that there might be some form of occupancy.
To one side of the corridor, there was another open door and I entered it. I was in a large room where, against one wall, stood four square glass containers, taller than myself, and each filled with a liquid. Within them, I also saw what looked like slabs of slate. I recalled what Auguste Duclois had said about electric batteries, and saw that they did resembled those seen at the Great Exhibition but built on a far bigger scale. There was also a large board with a tangle of wires on it, as well as a metal lever on something of the pattern of those in railway signal boxes.
So far, everything had gone swimmingly. I had not encountered any obstruction and I could begin sketching what I had discovered. Producing my notebook and blacklead pencil, I drew to the best of my ability the set of large containers, the board, and the lever.
Then I heard a footfall in a far corner of the gloomy room, looked towards it and quickly whipped my notebook behind my back as I saw a man of short stature emerging from a door, which the shadows had all but hidden.
“Who the devil are you? What are you doing here?” he bellowed as he advanced on me. He had