Arthur & George

hospitable and direct. For once, Arthur felt, it would not be a matter of beer and bootscrapers, of calculating whether the correct price of information was two shillings and threepence or two shillings and fourpence.
    ‘Wallie and Royden Sharp were the sons of my tenant farmer Peter Sharp,’ Mr Greatorex began. ‘They were rather wild boys. No, that’s perhaps unfair. Royden was a wild boy. I remember his father once had to pay for a rick he set on fire. Wallie was more strange than wild.
    ‘Royden was expelled from school – from Walsall. Both boys went there. Royden was idle and destructive, I gathered, though I never had the full story. Peter sent him next to Wisbech School, but that didn’t take any better. So he had him apprenticed to a butcher, by the name of Meldon I think, in Cannock. Then, towards the end of ’93, I became involved. The boys’ father was dying, and he asked me if I would become Royden’s trustee. It was the least I could do, and naturally I made what promises I could to Peter. I did my best, but Royden was simply uncontrollable. Nothing but trouble. Thieving, smashing things, lying constantly … wouldn’t stick at any job. In the end I said he had two choices. Either I would stop his allowance and report him to the police, or he could go to sea.’
    ‘We are aware of which alternative he chose.’
    ‘So I got him a passage as an apprentice on the
General Roberts
, belonging to Lewis Davies & Co.’
    ‘This would be when?’
    ‘At the end of 1895. The very end. I think she sailed on the 30th of December.’
    ‘And from which port, Mr Greatorex?’ Arthur knew the answer already, but still leaned forward in anticipation.
    ‘Liverpool.’
    ‘And how long did he stay with the
General Roberts
?’
    ‘Well, for once he stuck at something. He finished his apprenticeship about four years later, and got a third mate’s certificate. Then he came home.’
    ‘Does that take us to 1903?’
    ‘No, no. Earlier. ’01, I’m sure. But he was only home briefly, Then he got a billet on a cattle boat between Liverpool and America. He served ten months on it. And after that he came home permanently. That would have been in ’03.’
    ‘A cattle ship, indeed. And where is he now?’
    ‘In the same house his father had. But he’s much changed. He’s married, for a start.’
    ‘Did you ever suspect him or his brothers of writing the letters in your son’s name?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Why not?’
    ‘There were no grounds. And I would have judged him too idle, and perhaps not imaginative enough.’
    ‘And – let me guess – did they have a younger brother – perhaps a rather foul-mouthed boy, I would guess?’
    ‘No, no. There were just the two of them.’
    ‘Or a young companion of that kind, who was often with them?’
    ‘No. Not at all.’
    ‘I see. And did Royden Sharp resent your trusteeship?’
    ‘Frequently, yes. He didn’t understand why I refused to hand over all the money his father had left him. Not that there was much. A fact which made me all the more determined not to let him squander it.’
    ‘The other boy – Wallie – he was the elder?’
    ‘Yes, he’d be about thirty now.’
    ‘So that’s the one you were at school with, Harry?’ Charlesworth nodded. ‘You said he was strange. In what way?’
    ‘Strange. Not quite of this world. I can’t be more precise.’
    ‘Any signs of religious mania?’
    ‘Not that I was aware of. He was clever, Wallie. Brainy.’
    ‘Did he study Milton at Walsall School?’
    ‘Not that I was aware of.’
    ‘And after school?’
    ‘He was apprenticed to an electrical engineer for a while.’
    ‘Which would permit him to travel to the neighbouring towns?’
    Mr Greatorex looked puzzled by the question. ‘Certainly. Like many another man.’
    ‘And … do the brothers still live together?’
    ‘No, Wallie left the country a year or two back.’
    ‘Where did he go?’
    ‘South Africa.’
    Arthur turned to his secretary. ‘Why is everyone going to South Africa all of a sudden? Would you have an address for him there, Mr Greatorex?’
    ‘I might have done. Except that we heard he died. Recently. November last.’
    ‘Ah. A pity. And the house where they lived together, where Royden still lives …’
    ‘I can take you there.’
    ‘No, not yet. My question is … is it isolated?’
    ‘Fairly. Like many another house.’
    ‘So that you could enter or leave without neighbours observing you?’
    ‘Oh yes.’
    ‘And it