The Christmas Carol: A Jayne Sinclair Genealogical Mystery Read online

  The Christmas Carol

  A Jayne Sinclair Genealogical Mystery

  M. J. Lee

  About M. J. Lee

  Martin Lee is the author of contemporary and historical crime novels. The Christmas Carol is the eighth book featuring genealogical investigator, Jayne Sinclair.

  The Jayne Sinclair Series

  The Irish Inheritance

  The Somme Legacy

  The American Candidate

  The Vanished Child

  The Lost Christmas

  The Sinclair Betrayal

  The Merchant’s Daughter

  The Christmas Carol

  The Inspector Danilov Series

  Death in Shanghai

  City of Shadows

  The Murder Game

  The Killing Time

  The Inspector Thomas Ridpath thrillers

  Where the Truth Lies

  Where the Dead Fall

  Where the Silence Calls

  Where the Innocent Die

  When the Past Kills

  Other Fiction

  Samuel Pepys and the Stolen Diary

  The Fall

  pROLOGUE

  December 19, 1843

  Devonshire Terrace, London

  Charles Dickens sat at his desk, the pile of new books stacked in front of him.

  He had laboured hard on this novella, working in a frenzied fashion during the day and often taking long walks all over London at night. It was quickly written; less than six weeks from start to the final words of any author, even one as celebrated as him.

  The End.

  And now it was typeset, illustrated, printed and bound and published.

  He picked up one of the copies, admiring the gold stamping on the cover with his own name and the title surrounded by a gold wreath.

  He had been involved in every step of the process. Choosing the illustrator, John Leech, making sure he understood exactly what was expected. Overseeing the entire publishing process from selection of the paper and type, down to the hue of the gilt on the edge of the paper.

  His publishers, Chapman & Hall, had been less than supportive, even having the temerity to ask him to pay for the cost of publication.

  What had they done?

  Nothing but carp about costs and the failure of his latest serial, Martin Chuzzlewit .

  Never mind, at least now all the profits would go to him. He was sure it would do well; the first reviews had been laudatory. Even Thackeray had sent him his review: ‘Who can listen to objections regarding such a book as this? It seems to me a national benefit, and to every man or woman who reads it a personal kindness.’

  Dickens opened the cover, pressing down on the spine to flatten the book. He picked up his pen and, choosing the first blank page he found, thought for a few moments before beginning to write:

  To my friend, Robert Duckworth, and his son, of Manchester; a Christmas Present for showing me a Christmas Past and a Christmas yet to come.

  The words brought back memories of a long walk through the streets of Manchester in early October, with Robert and Lizzie Burns showing him extraordinary sights he would not have seen otherwise.

  He signed his name with a flourish and the whirlwind of curlicues that had become his trademark.

  He rang the bell for his servant and whilst waiting for the man to arrive, dusted the wet ink with pounce, blowing on it to encourage drying.

  The door opened and Topping stood in the doorway, a fleck of steamed pudding on the edge of his lip. Dickens had obviously disturbed the man’s lunch.

  He found a stout envelope and wrote the address on the cover, attaching a small note by way of explanation.

  Dear Mrs Gaskell,

  I have taken the liberty of sending you my latest novella. It is intended as a Christmas present for the guide you recommended during my time in Manchester, Robert Duckworth.

  I wonder if I could trouble you to give it to him before Christmas if at all possible. I visited his abode on Newberry Street but I am not sure of his precise address in Manchester.

  Thank you in advance.

  I remain your honourable and admiring servant,

  Charles Dickens

  He placed the note carefully in the book, sealing the envelope with his wax seal. ‘Please send this to Manchester. When will it arrive?’

  ‘If it is sent by crack coach, around nineteen hours, Mr Dickens. The mail by train is quicker at just over twelve hours, but more expensive.’

  ‘Send it by train.’

  ‘Yes, Mr Dickens.’

  The servant withdrew, taking the envelope and its precious book with him.

  Dickens sat for a moment, remembering the debt he owed Robert Duckworth. Without him, this book may not have been written.

  Then, he sat upright and took up his pen once more to send out more Christmas gifts.

  There was much to be done today; a day wasted on others is not wasted on one.

  Chapter ONE

  Monday, December 16, 2019

  Didsbury, Manchester

  Jayne Sinclair was running late.

  The clock said 11.30 and she was due at her meeting in town at noon.

  Damn. Damn. Damn.

  As ever, she had become engrossed in her research, losing complete track of time.

  She wanted to do something special for her stepmother, Vera, this Christmas. Rather than go to one of the department stores and buy some perfume, or something equally impersonal, Jayne decided a complete family tree with beautiful calligraphy created by her friend, Carol, would be the perfect present.

  Ever since Jayne had managed to find Vera’s long-lost brother in Australia, it was something she had planned to do, but work, life and the day-to-day pressures of running her own business had meant the gift had always been postponed.

  But Christmas was the time to give something special, wasn’t it? And she knew Vera would be thrilled with it, something she would treasure.

  Of course, time and other clients had meant Jayne could only start that morning. She had risen fairly early at 7.30 a.m., when it was still dark outside and the wind was howling through the leafless trees.

  Mr Smith was already back from his nighttime activities in the suburbs of Manchester, hovering over his empty bowl. She fed and watered him as she fixed herself a coffee from her Nespresso machine.

  The aroma of coffee filled the air as Jayne switched on her computer and logged on. From a file in the drawer, she took out a blank family tree chart and from her bag she pulled out her Montblanc pen.

  It was one of her eccentricities. When she was creating a family tree, she always wrote in the brightest vermilion ink on a hard copy, transferring the details on to the computer later. It was a little old-fashioned but it was her way of commemorating the lives of the people she listed. On this sheet of paper, they were going to be remembered once again.

  The dead brought back to life.

  ‘Time to begin,’ she said out loud.

  Luckily, she had already done some of the work on Vera’s maternal line, the Duckworths, last year when she had investigated the ‘vanished son’, as her stepmother called him. But it wouldn’t hurt to re-check her sources. In genealogy, you can never check enough.

  She uncapped the pen and wrote in Vera’s maiden name – Vera Atkins. She could add the married names later along with those of her children. But first she’d have a chat with Robert, her stepfather. Her feeling was the chart should focus on Vera, not on her life as a married woman.

  She drew in two other boxes. One for Vera’s full brother, Charles, born in 1949. The other was for h
er half-brother, Harry. He had been born as the result of a wartime liaison between Vera’s mother and a soldier killed during the D Day landings.

  The mother had given him up to a children’s home, always intending to find him again once her life was settled. Unfortunately, before she could arrange his return, he was sent to Australia as part of a postwar exodus of child migrants. He had suffered greatly at the hands of the Christian Brothers at the school in Bindoon, but had finally built a successful life for himself in Perth.

  Despite never meeting for sixty-seven years, they became instant friends when Vera flew to Australia. Every Sunday morning since without fail, they chatted to each other on the phone, making up for lost time.

  On the next line, Jayne wrote in Vera’s parents’ names and details, checking her notes for the exact dates of birth and death.

  Norman Atkins

  10.01.21 - 07.05.94.

  Freda Duckworth

  10.04.26 - 10.06.10

  There was always something comforting about seeing the names on the family tree, the boxes beginning to be filled in with names and dates.

  Outside, the weather was cold, the wind howling and beating against the kitchen windows.

  Inside, Jayne was focused on the task in hand. It was time to re-check the details of Vera’s grandparents. She had done this quickly before, but now was the time to go into more detail.

  She decided to write in the maternal line first, the Duckworths, as she already had notes from her previous work.

  She dug out the file and wrote in the names and birth dates of Vera’s maternal grandparents.

  Francis Duckworth

  1903 - 1967

  Dora Burns

  1905 - 1983

  They had married in 1926, with Dora giving birth to Freda in April of the same year.

  Jayne then wrote in the Duckworth great-grandparents and all their children, whom she had found in the 1911 Census. They had been living in Oldham at the time and there was an older person with the same surname living with them. Unfortunately, his relation to the head of the household had been left blank.

  Thomas Henry Duckworth

  1879 -1924

  Eliza Duckworth

  1874 -1931

  Margaret Duckworth

  1899 -????

  Samuel Duckworth

  1901 -????

  Francis Duckworth

  1903 -1966

  Hermione Duckworth

  1905 -????

  Charles Duckworth

  1854 -????

  Thomas Henry and Eliza were very consistent; a child every two years, she thought.

  Jayne wrote a couple of notes to herself to follow up next time she researched.

  What was Eliza Duckworth’s maiden name? What happened to their children? Dates of death? Marriages? Children?

  Check out Charles Duckworth. Great-great-grandfather??? Great-great grand-uncle??

  There were probably a whole host of relatives that Vera knew nothing about. Later, when Jayne had taken the family back to the 1881 Census she would link up with the Lost Cousins website to discover the names of these people.

  That was all the research she had done in 2017 regarding Vera’s maternal line. Time to bring the paternal line to the same level.

  But first she decided another coffee was needed. When she was researching a family line, she lived on coffee. It was her fuel, keeping her going when she reached the inevitable brick walls.

  She stood up, stretched and put a capsule in the Nespresso machine. ‘Jewels’, the marketing people called these things. What a load of tripe.

  What had happened to the simple cup of coffee?

  When she was growing up it was just a teaspoon of granules in a cup and hot water dumped on top. Now it was single country beans, roasted over banana leaves and picked by vestal virgins. There was even one coffee that came from the excreta of a type of civet cat.

  She glanced across at Mr Smith.

  ‘There’s no way I’m drinking anything that’s been through your guts.’

  He pretended to be asleep, but his ears twitched, always a giveaway that he’d heard her.

  The machine finished whirring and pouring. She picked up her espresso cup and smelt the aroma, taking a small sip of the dark, bitter coffee. Instantly, she felt a nice hit of caffeine kick in the back of her brain.

  She had to admit it was far better than any of the instant coffee she had ever tried. Perhaps there was something in this idea of progress after all.

  ‘Right, back to work.’

  It was time to tackle Vera’s father’s family and see what secrets came to light.

  Chapter TWO

  October 3, 1843

  Devonshire Terrace, London

  Charles Dickens was late, but he comforted himself that he wasn’t the late Charles Dickens.

  He stepped out of Devonshire Terrace, making a mental note to remember the word ‘play’ for use in one of his serials.

  The Hackney carriage was waiting outside his door, held open for him by his flame-haired servant, William Topping. Neither his wife nor his children had come to see him off, but he preferred it that way. Long emotional goodbyes were tedious, the stuff of novels rather than real life.

  He heaved his carpetbag into the carriage. The inside stank of tobacco, a harsh pungent smell from a cheroot rather than the warm hug of a pipe. ‘To Euston Station, cabbie. I would be much obliged if you could drive quickly, I’m late.’

  The side of the cabbie’s head appeared through the little window cut into the fabric of the roof. He touched the peak of his battered hat and said, ‘As your honour pleases, a fast drive it is.’

  The cabbie clicked his tongue three times and the carriage jerked forward, pulling out into the traffic, the clip clop of the horse’s shoes resounding on the road.

  ‘Won’t be long, sir. Just up here on to the new road, past the university and we’re there. Won’t be more than two shakes of a donkey’s leg.’

  Dickens relaxed back into the horsehair seats, ignoring the smell. ‘Thank you, cabbie.’

  ‘It’s Fezziwig, sir. Albert Fezziwig, late of the Second Dragoons, Lieutenant-Colonel Hamilton commanding and Waterloo, sir.’

  ‘You were in the Scot’s Greys?’

  ‘Indeed I was, sir.’ A face appeared in the window, a rugged scar running down across the left eye and on to the cheek. ‘A French sword gave me this, sir, but he didn’t give it no one else. I runs him through quicker than you can say “the Prince of Wales”.’

  ‘Do you remember the battle?’

  ‘Not much, sir, to be honest. After I gets my wound, it’s all a bit of a muddle. Luckily, I was saved by the surgeon, Mr Bell. Right good he was with a needle and cat gut.’

  ‘You’re lucky to be alive.’

  ‘I counts my lucky stars every day, sir.’ There was a long pause. ‘You taking one of those trains today, sir?’

  ‘I am indeed.’

  A long exhale of breath. ‘You wouldn’t catch me dead on one of those. Well, it ain’t natural, is it? Going so fast pulled along by a monster.’

  ‘It’s a steam engine and the best ones can go at thirty miles an hour.’

  ‘Oi, you, watch where you’re going with that hoss!’ A loud shout followed by a louder hawk and the sound of a gob of spit being expelled along with a wad of chewing tobacco. ‘Goin’ that fast is enough to make your head fall off. I thinks if God wanted us to go faster he would have made hosses with six legs.’

  ‘Fezziwig, that’s an interesting name.’

  ‘Got it from my father, but don’t know where he got it from, sir.’

  The cab swung a hard left, throwing Dickens against the side.

  ‘We’s here now, sir, let me take you to the landing stage.’

  The cabbie raced through the Doric portico, joining a long queue of Hackneys waiting to disgorge their passengers at the alighting point. Dickens leant forward to rap on the roof. ‘Here will do, Mr Fezziwig.’

  ‘That’ll be two sh
illings, your honour. Plus an extra shilling for the speed on accounts of the hoss will need more oats this evening.’ A hand came in through the hole, palm upwards. Dickens could see the dirt engrained into the creases of the palms.

  ‘Here’s five shillings, keep the change.’

  The hand received the money and in the blink of an eye the door of the cab opened, Mr Fezziwig standing there, a broad smile across his face. ‘It’s been a pleasure to drive your honour. Will I be calling a porter? But I would h-advise they are thievin’ bastards, beggin’ your honour’s pardon.’

  ‘No, I won’t be needing one, thank you.’

  ‘No, thank you, your honour, for gracin’ my ’umble cab. It ain’t often I ’ave a famous writer in my cab. One day, I had that Mr Thackeray, but he ain’t ’alf as good as you.’

  ‘You’ve read my work?’

  Mr Fezziwig laughed. ‘By my word, you are a card, sir. Me reading? Not a chance. I fink the hoss could do a better job of reading than me.’ The cabbie reached in and placed Dickens’ bag in his hand. ‘’Ave a good journey, sir.’ He looked back as a puff of steam erupted from a platform. ‘But rather you than me.’

  Dickens walked away past the bowing Fezziwig. The concourse of the station was bustling with passengers, porters, and the myriad visitors who had come to see one of the wonders of the modern age; the steam engines being turned on their turntables to make their return journeys to Birmingham. On the left, a long queue snaked out in front of the booking office. Luckily, he had sent Topping down yesterday to buy the ticket.

  Dickens spotted one of the station managers for the London and Birmingham Railway. ‘The mail train for Birmingham?’ he asked.

  ‘Just in time, sir.’ The man took out a silver hunter pocket watch. ‘It departs on the dot at 9.45. Can’t keep the Queen’s mail waiting.’