Kearney slammed the door shut behind them then returned to the window. Fallon was still talking animatedly to the neighbour. Kearney opened the window and leant out defiantly.
‘You’ll never get me, Fallon!’ he roared.
‘Come down here, you rat!’ demanded the other, ‘or I’ll come up there and fetch you. This tenement has been infected by you for too long.’
Fallon was about to head for the door when he heard a maniacal laugh from above. Looking up, he saw that Kearney was clambering out of the window. The chimney sweep had decided that the one way to escape death at Fallon’s hands was to kill himself. With a cry of triumph, he flung himself into the air and hurtled down from the top floor of the tenement, hitting the paved surface of the court with a bone-crunching thud that brought an instant crowd. Within seconds, the broken body was an island in a sea of blood.
Cheated out of his revenge, Fallon went over and spat on the corpse.
Peter Skillen stayed well behind him. As he entered Hyde Park, David Beyton followed the prescribed route at the gentle pace Peter had recommended. The clerk was soon walking past the scores of other people enjoying a stroll in the afternoon sun. There were some trees ahead and – having reconnoitred the park earlier – Peter had told his wife to loiter there. Accompanied by their servant, Charlotte would be largely concealed from view yet would be able to see clearly the path that the clerk was taking. Once he was mingling with the crowd, Peter was able to lengthen his stride so that he could get closer to Beyton.
He was no more than thirty yards away when the exchange took place. It happened so quickly that it would have been easy to miss the incident altogether. A young woman seemed to bump into Beyton. After she’d said something to him, she walked swiftly away. Peter knew at once that she’d taken the ransom money. The woman cut across the grass and went past a knot of people. When she came out the other side, Peter was waiting to intercept her.
‘Excuse me,’ he said, blocking her path. ‘I’d like a word.’
‘What do you want of me?’ she asked in surprise.
‘The first thing you can do is to return the money you just took from Mr Beyton. After that, you can tell me your name and that of your accomplice.’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, sir. I have no accomplice.’
‘Do you deny that you took charge of a purse?’
‘No, I don’t.’
He extended a palm. ‘Then hand it over.’
‘I don’t have it any more, sir.’
‘Where is it?’
‘I gave it to the lady who asked me to take it from her brother,’ explained the woman. ‘That’s all I did. I have no idea what was in the purse. I simply passed it on to the lady as she requested.’
‘Which lady?’
‘She didn’t tell me her name.’
Peter was livid. He’d been duped. Patently, the woman in front of him was not one of the kidnappers. She’d been told a plausible tale and had agreed to take a purse from a man who was walking towards her. Unseen by Peter, she’d slipped it to one of the people he was really after. Though she’d taken part unwittingly in a criminal act, he could not blame her. After apologising, he sent her on her way.
David Beyton came panting up to him in despair.
‘Why did you let her go?’
‘She was not the woman we’re after, Mr Beyton.’
‘But she took the money from me.’
‘That’s all she was paid to do. She was an intermediary who passed on the purse to the woman who actually hired her.’
‘So where is the money now?’ wailed the other.
Peter shrugged an apology. ‘I don’t know.’
‘I thought that you were going to arrest someone.’
‘So did I.’
‘Instead of that, I’ve lost all that money and have no guarantee that they’ll stick to their side of the bargain. What’s going to happen now?’
‘In my opinion,’ said Peter, ‘there may be grave repercussions.’
When they got back to the house, they counted out the money and found that it was the correct amount but that didn’t soften Diamond’s annoyance.
‘He disobeyed his orders.’
‘I had a feeling that he might do so,’ said Jane Holdstock. ‘I hoped that we’d frightened him enough but I was mistaken. What exactly happened?’
‘As soon as that woman had given you the purse, a man came out of the crowd and accosted her. He was clearly there in support of Beyton. Had you taken the purse on your own, you’d have been arrested.’
‘It’s just as well that you were there.’