Page 43 of The Journal of a Thousand Years
Willie cocked the gun.
“All right! I’ll tell you. The only other place I know him to go is a pub near Borough Market, The Fisherman’s Inn.”
Willie stepped back. “See, that wasn’t so hard.”
The bookmaker glanced around. When he was sure no one was watching and we wouldn’t recapture him, he hurried off, back the way he’d come.
“I thought you were going to take a piss behind the tree,” Willie called out.
“Think I’ll use the privy, after all.”
Willie returned the gun to her waistband. “Do you think he told the truth?”
“Only one way to find out,” Alex said.
I fell into step alongside him. “I truly don’t think Thurlow took Gabe.”
Alex sighed. “Where else do we look?”
“Jakes.”
“If Jakes has Gabe, then his capture was sanctioned by the government, and they won’t return him until they’re ready. Besides, I don’t see Jakes breaking into the house at five in the morning with a thug in tow.”
“What if his activities aren’t sanctioned by Military Intelligence? What if he’s acting outside the scope of his orders?”
Alex eyed me sideways. “You may have a point, but I think we should go to Thurlow’s pub first. If that yields nothing, we’ll look into Jakes.”
Willie must have thought my suggestion had merit, too, because she gave me another pat on the back, this one gentler than the last.
It wasimpossible to find parking close to Borough Market, so we parked the motorcar a few streets away and walked. Tucked behind Southwark Cathedral and a stone’s throw from London Bridge, the market was dusty, busy and noisy. Stallholdersshouted over the top of each other, vying for customers, but they were intermittently drowned out by the trains traveling on the viaducts above. The stalls, selling fresh farm produce, were crammed into any available space, including under the railway arches and on neighboring streets. The loud, thriving center of activity epitomized London in this postwar, post-influenza era of enterprise and energy. I wasn’t sure whether I liked it or loathed it, but I appreciated it nonetheless.
The Fisherman’s Inn was jammed up against one of the massive viaduct supports. A patchwork of posters and flyers were pasted to the support’s brickwork. The old timber pub with its low doorway and mullioned windows looked out of place beside the more modern architecture, but I was pleased to see the railway hadn’t consumed the historic building altogether.
Like most of the pubs in the market’s vicinity, The Fisherman’s Inn opened at six AM to serve beer to thirsty porters who assisted stallholders in the early hours of the morning. Some of them had lingered, chatting quietly at the bar, or napping in a corner booth. Thurlow wasn’t among them.
I let Willie and Alex question the barman and the drinkers. The response from all was the same—no one knew a man named Thurlow, nor did they know of anyone matching his description. It wasn’t obvious if they lied or not, but it was clear we weren’t going to get a different answer. Willie didn’t even attempt to threaten them. Perhaps, like me, she doubted that Thurlow was guilty of capturing Gabe, after all.
Outside, we trudged back the way we’d come. “We’ll call on Jakes,” Alex said.
I looked up at him, but something past his shoulder caught my eye. I stopped and pointed at one of the posters pasted to the viaduct support. “That’s him! That’s the man Sally saw!”
I tore the poster off the wall and studied the sketch. The brutish face with the scraggly hair past the shoulders matchedthe police artist’s drawing. The figure on the poster was thickset and he stood in a boxer’s stance, fists at the ready. He glared back at me as if daring me to take him on.
Willie took the poster and read. “‘See Mad Dog Mitchell fight for the bare-knuckle championship this Thursday at The Rose and Thorn.’”
Alex slapped the poster with the back of his hand. “That’s where I’ve seen him before: The Rose and Thorn. I went to that fight. It was last year. He lost, then disappeared from the fight scene altogether. He never entered another bout as far as I know.”
“Isn’t bare-knuckle boxing illegal?” I asked.
Alex looked sheepish. “I went from time to time after the war ended. I needed the distraction in those days.”
The brutal sport had been outlawed for good reason. Without gloves and with few rules, fighters received terrible injuries. Clearly his loss hadn’t affected Mad Dog Mitchell physically. He was still capable of abduction.
Willie folded the poster and tucked it into her pocket. “I reckon he’s a hired thug for sure. Who better to carry out illegal activity than a big man who can take care of himself and doesn’t care about laws.”
“Change of plans,” Alex said as we set off again. “We’ll go to The Rose and Thorn. Jakes can wait.”
It was a good plan, since none of us thought we could make Jakes confess anyway. We needed irrefutable evidence of his involvement. Hopefully Mad Dog Mitchell could give it to us. First, we had to find him.
