The Detective Wore Silk Drawers Read Online Free PDF Page A

Breeding will out, thought Cribb wryly. “Ever heard talk of prize fighting going on these days?”
    “Yes. There are those who hint at it. A whisper goes round that there’s sport to be had in some quiet corner of Kent or Essex, and a party’s got up to make an excursion. It’s not partridge or pheasant those characters go to find, Sergeant. But I think it prudent to close my ears to such talk.”
    “You’ve heard nothing of the fights themselves. No names?”
    “No, but if I showed interest—”
    “Do they know you’re in the force?”
    Jago gave thought to the question. His thinking processes were markedly less agile than Cribb’s.
    “I don’t arrive in my uniform, and I most certainly avoid conversation about my duties. It’s possible that someone has heard of my matches in the police tournament, but I rather doubt that. They don’t treat me with the suspicion that one customarily encounters.”
    “Good. When are you next going to the Anchor?”
    “Tomorrow at lunchtime was the next training session I planned. There are usually several sparring partners available around noon. I limber for thirty minutes or so, and then have half a dozen rounds with whoever is there. A most interesting assortment of men find their way there. Military officers, undergraduates, members of the Stock Exchange—”
    “You know their professions,” Cribb rapped out. “What’s to prevent them from knowing yours?”
    “I keep it to myself, Sergeant. If they ask, I say I’m engaged in clerical work at Whitehall. Which I am, more’s the pity.”
    Cribb was satisfied. He had harboured reservations about Jago’s ability to carry out detective work.
    “Very well. If you want action, I can arrange it. From tomorrow onwards you’ll be working for me, and your duties will start at the Anchor. I need information about prize fighting and you’re the man to seek it out—names, places, times. Handle this carefully. Listen, rather than interrogate, but don’t be reluctant to show interest. Are you game?”
    Henry Jago was game, and Sergeant Cribb left at once to arrange his transfer to M Division.
    ¦ To a field on the Moat Farm, a mile north of Rainham on the Southend Road, came three strangers. They carried a length of rope looped around the shoulders of the tallest, a bundle of stakes and a mallet. After agitated discussion and pointing of hands, they approached a patch of ground more even than the rest. Watched by a trio of interested sheep, they paced the shape of a square in earnest concentration. Four of the stakes were distributed at the corners and one was driven securely into the earth. The rope was attached to it, and payed out to a length of about eight yards, previously marked on the rope with white paint. The position for the second stake was measured and marked, but it was not fixed in the ground. Nor were the other two, although their points were used to make shallow holes in the turf. When this surveying exercise was complete, the men carried stakes, ropes and mallet to the hedge bordering the field and secreted them in the longer grass there. Their business completed, they returned towards Rainham.
    ¦ Two full days passed. Thackeray was sent to ask questions of the clientele in a list of public houses famous for their boxing promotions, from the Swan at Upper Clapton to the Marquis of Granby at Lambeth. All he learned was the Queensberry Rules and the potency of wines in wood. Jago sparred at the Anchor gymnasium until his ribs ached, and talked into the small hours with the trainers there. He learned the roll of champions from Figg to Mace. Sergeant Cribb attended an inquest on the headless pugilist and learned that he died from causes unknown. “The medical witnesses have not established indisputably that this unfortunate man died as the result of his beheading,” the coroner had said. “True, the post-mortem revealed no other cause of death, but until and unless the head of this corpse can be located, the