Chapter 293: If I can avenge my wrongs in the future, I will stain the Thames with blood.
Chapter 291: If I can avenge my wrongs in other years, blood will stain the mouth of the Thames (5K)
Outside the Astley Amphitheater, Tony, who had already held the position of sheriff for a year, scanned the pedestrians on the road back and forth.
After making sure that everything was in order, Tony’s footsteps took a sudden turn and walked into the alley at the side of the road.
The red wall of the alley is leaning against a few laughing and smoking a cigarette police officers, in the face of such a situation, Tony neither with them to set up what the officer frame, also did not move out of the Scotland Yard’s bullshit regulations, after all, when he was also so over.
Tony just familiarly took out the pipe in his pocket, opened the tobacco box and filled some into it, and then rushed to a few of them and snapped his fingers and shouted, “Lend a hand with the fire.”
A few officers saw the officer coming, and one of them smiled as they pulled out the matches in their pockets and handed them over, “Sir, you also come to amuse yourself?”
Tony lit the fire, sipped fiercely and spat out a white mist: “Brothers, be serious, there are a lot of big shots in the Astley Theater today, if anything happens, we will all have to pay for it.”
“Sir, the Asterix Theater is so big, we deployed 500 police officers, it’s enough to turn the place upside down. Don’t worry, nothing will happen tonight.”
Tony sniffed and glared at them, “When nothing happens, you can say whatever you want. When something goes wrong, then they all roll up and leave. I know that with Scotland Yard’s treatment, there’s no way to let everyone put their lives on the line, but for a mission that doesn’t take much, it’s better to try to carry it out as seriously as possible.
And if you do the math, the conditions are much better now than they were in the old days. Ordinary sergeant can get 39 pounds a year just for his rank salary, and if you add in all kinds of subsidies, it’s not a problem to get 45 pounds a year. It’s not a high salary in London, but it’s still a good job, so take it with a grain of salt.”
The officers listened to this and some talked to Tony about other things.
“Sir, I heard that we used to be paid less than this?”
“Lower than 39 pounds? Then I might as well find a big family to watch the door for others, at least they still take care of food and shelter there, London is good everywhere, but the rent and clothes and food are a little bit too expensive.”
“You two youngsters are in good hands. When I first came to Scotland Yard, the rank and file pay was just over thirty pounds. At that time there were indeed many people who quit their jobs to work as janitors, not only did they take care of their food and shelter, but they were also paid about the same as if they had worked at Scotland Yard.”
“That’s right, and if Superintendent Hastings hadn’t argued with the Home Office last year to move our weekly pay up by three shillings, I might have left too.”
The two new police officers heard this and wondered.
From the time they had just entered the service of Scotland Yard, they had often heard the name Arthur Hastings. In the mouths of the old frontline patrol officers, Superintendent Hastings had simply become a legend, after all, he had only spent two years working his way up from second class patrol sergeant to superintendent level, something that could be spread around as a CD City legend wherever he was placed.
Even in order to rationalize this, all kinds of conspiracy theory-like speculations were born in the police officer community.
Some said that Superintendent Hastings was a side branch of the Marquis of Hastings’ family, some said that he was Sir Peel’s illegitimate son, and some said that he was the young lover kept by a lady who was too honored to say her name.
But no matter what background the police officers made up for Arthur, his feats that couldn’t be written on a single page were also real, plus he had actually gotten a raise for Scotland Yard as well, so whichever old police officer brought up the name Arthur Hastings would give a thumbs up.
The younger officers, on the other hand, preferred to enquire about that special operations department, the Greater London Constabulary’s Criminal Investigation Department, which was headed by Superintendent Hastings.
Almost everyone knew that officers who worked there received a special departmental allowance of up to ten pounds a year in addition to their rank salary, and that pay gap alone was enough for officers to rank the Criminal Crime Investigation Department as the upper echelon of Scotland Yard.
What’s more, this department had a police secretary named Bonaparte a while back.
To be able to work with the royal relatives in the same organization, this makes the police officers feel honored, but also makes them can not help but respect the Criminal Investigation Department, which in turn, their evaluation of the department also continued to be upgraded by one grade.
The Criminal Investigation Department was no longer just the upper echelon of Scotland Yard, it was simply the aristocracy of the police, and some people even privately nicknamed Arthur, who was in charge of the department, the Archduke of Hastings.
The young officers looked at the CID abbreviated number of the Criminal Investigation Department hanging on Tony’s chest, and their mouths were practically watering as they cautiously inquired.
“Sir, can I take the liberty of asking, do I need to prepare something if I want to enter the Criminal Intelligence Department? I’ve heard that recruiting there seems to be quite strict? It seems like there’s an exam isn’t there?”
“Examination? Well …… that’s right, there is an exam now.”
Tony scratched his rolling cheeks and spoke, “Originally, Superintendent Hastings wanted to recruit people directly from the University of London, but the treatment of the Criminal Investigation Department is placed in front of the university students, it’s still a bit inadequate. Coupled with the fact that business has been good lately, the railroad company and the shipping company are all recruiting, those people can casually get a good salary and do a decent job in the company, where would they want to come to Scotland Yard to fight with criminals?”
“That’s right, where can college students stand our kind of work. Criminals start hard, will not give you the opportunity to talk about your studies, you have not even opened your mouth, his little hand shaking to stab you in the lung tube.”
“Let’s study on our own, although it’s impossible to match the university students, but what we learn is practical ah! Superintendent Hastings really should give our frontline brothers a chance, twenty-six letters I can recognize all of them, the rest is not all by heart?”
“So, what’s the internal selection test for? Sir, I’m not asking you to give us a list of questions, just give us the scope!”
Speaking of this, a police officer saw Tony’s pipe go out, and hurriedly smiled and touched out his own matchbox and sent it over: “Sir, you can keep this box of matches for now, I have something else here.”
“Thank you very much then.”
Tony received the matchbox, just opened the box with the intention of taking fire, but found two shilling coins pressed squarely inside, he looked down at the matchbox, tangled for a while, and finally put it into his pocket.
“I don’t know what the exam will be about, after all, Superintendent Hastings has been so busy lately that putting out papers has been put on the back burner of his priorities.”
Hearing this, the officer handing the matches couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed, “This, so that’s how it is ……”
Tony shrugged, “But when I was delivering papers to Superintendent Hastings the other day, I happened to see a copy of Principles of Chemical Philosophy next to his desk, that monograph by Mr. Faraday’s mentor, Sir Humphry Davy. That’s a very interesting book, and I’ve been reading it lately, so if you’re interested, you might consider buying a copy and going back to it, and I’m sure the knowledge will help you in your police work.”
“Ah ……” the officers couldn’t help but be delighted at the words, “Sir, if not to say that you are the backbone of the Criminal Investigation Department, this insight is indeed wider than the average police officer.”
Tony put away his pipe and raised an eyebrow, “Better get to work after your smoke! Tonight is Superintendent Hastings’ one-man show, and whoever screws up this job, then I don’t think there’s any need to think about the exam.”
“Understood, sir! We’ll be back on duty now!”
A few officers saluted Tony with smiles on their faces, then jogged all the way out of the alley.
Tony leaned against the red wall and breathed a long sigh of relief, he was just about to refill his pipe when he suddenly saw Tom darting past on the street in front of him.
Tony hurriedly called out to him, “Tom, what are you doing?”
Tom twisted his head to look, found the smoking Tony, can not help but run up a belly of fire, he slapped Tony’s pipe in the hand, glared and scolded: “Tony, you still have the heart to smoke it? The front post has just checked a wave of big, intercepted his mother fast thirty pounds of black powder, you smoke a little more, later we two simply do not go to see Arthur, directly in front of God to do the work report it!”
“Huh?”
……
The makeshift sentry hut next to the Astley Amphitheater.
Ledley King Negative, a progressive young man who had just been promoted to sub-sergeant of the Whitechapel Police Department, had both feet up on his desk and looked up at the fat Frenchman sitting in front of him with a dirt-stained face and the young Jewish man wearing a tall bowler hat and an unbelievably fancy dress.
Disraeli’s face was accompanied by a smile, while Dumas met him with a disdainful look.
Yet it was this one look that seemed to instantly enrage the young officer who had not long improved.
Sergeant Ridley suddenly rose with a start and slammed the table, “Speak! Where did you come from, where did you go, what is the composition of your family, what are the nationalities of your family members! What social relations do you have, and is there an emperor in your ancestry! If there was an emperor, did he fight the Battle of Waterloo!”
Dumas had thought to have a good fight with this despised little policeman, unexpectedly the other side of this series of questions smashed on his head, directly smashed him into a daze. Dumas froze for a long time, frowned and asked, “How do you know that I am an upright and honorable French citizen?”
Ledley froze for a moment at his words as well, and he muttered, “Eh? I hit a good thing again? Is this physique of mine inviting the French? If I had been born a few years earlier and joined the Royal Navy, I’d probably be rich by now, right?”
Disraeli, who had been so careful lately in order to elect MPs, called out in his heart that it was bad luck, and he opened his mouth and asked in a low voice, “What are you talking about, officer?”
“Nothing” Ridley coughed and sat back in his chair, he took out a piece of paper and opened his mouth, “The first question, what is your name?”
Disraeli heart calculation for a while, finally decided to tell the truth, if this time to say false, turn around Arthur probably do not know he and Dumas in order to stand up for him was put in jail, at that time even fishing are not good to fish them.
“Benjamin Disraeli. Officer, I think there must be some kind of misunderstanding here.”
Ridley swished and made a note on the paper, “No misunderstanding. To say that the two of you are really good, carrying a sack and waddling out, those who don’t know, would think that you are fellows from some bakery.”
Ledley finished this note, and then opened his mouth to ask, “Your father’s name.”
“Huh? You have to ask that too?”
“Cut the crap, are you going to say it or not?”
Disraeli couldn’t do anything about it as he sniffed, and he truthfully said, “Isaac Disraeli.”
“Very well, never heard of it, this one should be able to catch.” Ridley nodded slightly and muttered, then turned his head to look at Dumas again, “Your turn, Fatty.”
Dumas grunted with his arms wrapped around him, “Alexander Dumas.”
“And your father?”
“Alexander Dumas.”
Ridley put down his pen at that, and he pondered for a moment, “Your father’s name is also Alexander Dumas? Fatty, you’re not lying to me, are you?”
Dumas disdainfully said, “Is it strange for a father and son to share the same name? You guys still have a bunch of Charles in England, what’s all the fuss about?”
Ledley thought about it and finally decided to try him twice, “So what’s your grandfather’s name?”
“Alexandre Antoine David de la Payetree.”
“Huh?” Ledley froze at that, “That long?”
Dumas smoothed back his curls, “Aristocratic, my grandfather was a marquis.”
“Marquis …… Wow ……”
Ledley looked at the paper in his hand and pondered for a moment, “But …… that’s not right, is it? You and your father’s last name is Dumas, and your grandfather’s last name is Payatri, is there something in between? Is your father a bastard?”
Dumas glared, “What do you care? Why do you ask so many questions?”
Ledley shook his head and bristled at this, “I’m just curious, and I don’t mean to expose your scars. Let me ask one last question then.”
“What question?”
Ledley looked a little embarrassed, he smiled shyly, “What about that …… how do you spell that surname of yours, Zhongma? Of course, I’m not uneducated, I just wanted to test you.”
Ledley this just finished, then heard a sound of a door opening behind him.
He turned his head to see that it was the two big red men under Superintendent Hastings, he hurriedly stood up and greeted them both, “What brings you two here?”
Ledley greeted them both, but Tom and Tony did not reply.
The two of them were directly stunned by the nine pistols placed on the desk and a sack full of black powder and pellets leaning against the desk.
Disraeli and Dumas also immediately relaxed when they saw their acquaintances coming.
Disraeli smiled and winked at them both, “Tom, Tony?”
Tom’s eyes widened as he looked at the appalling number of things, and he opened his mouth to ask, “Are you two crazy? Even if it’s for self-defense, isn’t it too much to bring this much?”
Tony also took a deep breath, “This firepower is almost as much as a police station, Mr. Zhongma, are you planning to wipe out our patrol? Take my advice, Napoleon has been dead for how many years now, you’d better quench your mind of attacking Britain earlier.”
Dumas sniffed and rushed to utilize his skill of making up stories, he coughed and said, “Tony, this gun and ammunition are not for myself.”
Tony slapped his forehead, “That’s for sure, Mr. Dumas, if these were for yourself, we wouldn’t have arrested you yet.”
Tom sniffed and retorted, “No, you still have to be arrested. Suicide is a felony crime of blasphemy, and if Mr. Chung Ma succeeds in committing suicide, at most the priest won’t give him a funeral. But if he didn’t succeed in committing suicide, then we’ll still have to hang him on the gallows some day.”
Laidley sniffed and added: “But hanged on the gallows has a good point, so that the priest will be willing to give you a ceremony, the dead into the coffin, rest service, buried in the ground, to engage in this set of their most skillful.”
Dumas said angrily: “In that case, you hang me, I have to thank you?”
Ledley said in a serious manner, “You’re welcome. If you go to heaven because of this, just remember to put in a good word for me to God. But if it’s going to hell, you shouldn’t pussyfoot around in Satan’s ear.”
Hearing this, Tony hurriedly stepped forward to block Ledley’s body, and winked at Dumas and Disraeli, “What on earth are you two doing with all this stuff? Scotland Yard announced a long time ago that gun control would be in place around the Astley Theater during Halloween, and you two are friends with Superintendent Hastings, so it’s impossible that you don’t know about this …… or that Superintendent Hastings put you up to this?”
Hearing this, Disraeli hurriedly took over Tony’s words, “Tony, really nothing can be hidden from you. That’s right, it was Arthur who told us to bring these over.”
Dumas also picked up, “That’s right. I heard Arthur say a while ago that Mr. Louis Bonaparte is training a team of French artillery for Scotland Yard. But when it comes to French artillery, who knows more than I do? Not only must French artillery be trained to strict French standards, even the guns and ammunition must be of French origin.”
Speaking here, Dumas also leaned down and fished a handful of blackish gunpowder from the bag, letting them slip through his fingers, “Look at it! This black powder, all rubbed by my hand. Do you know why the artillery of France is more powerful than the artillery of other countries? It’s all because our black powder is secretly made, and this craft is all passed down from our ancestors.”
Tom froze for a moment, then asked suspiciously, “Mr. Dumas, are you serious?”
Tony heard Tom ask a question and hurriedly glared back at him, “Tom!”
Who knows that before he could send Tom a code word, Ledley over there had already learned with a dazed face the same action that Inspector Jones, who had already become the talking head of the Tauerhamletts police district, had once done.
Ledley clasped his hands in the direction of the Astley Amphitheater, and asked in a loud and clear voice, “Aaaaaaah! Am I not committing the same kind of blunder that Zeus did to Mount Olympus and Thor blew up the Temple of the Spirit? I didn’t know that you two were friends of Superintendent Hastings, the Archduke of Scotland Yard!”
(End of chapter)