“Prentice was born in Rotherhithe in 1843,” he continued after a moment, turning the pages of his notebook, “so he’s in his mid-forties now. As a young man, he took to the sea, and spent some years sailing between England and Australia. After a while, however, he tired of these long voyages and transferred his services as a crewman to the countless number of smaller vessels plying between England and the Continent. This decision was perhaps influenced by the fact that he had, in 1866, married a local girl, Ann Cooke. For the next eight years or so he worked on these relatively short voyages to all the many ports of the European mainland. During this period, two children were born to the Prentices, a boy, William, in ’67, and a girl, Lily, in ’68.

“On the surface, then, Jack Prentice’s life appeared straightforward, law-abiding and above board. However, the police authorities in Rotherhithe began to suspect that there was a little more to it than there appeared to be. There had at that time been a spate of burglaries in the West End, and the police were concerned that very few of the stolen items – jewellery and so on – were turning up again. Although the police were not, it must be said, very successful at solving any of these crimes, their record of eventually recovering the stolen property was reasonably good, thanks mainly to a network of paid informers, but also to their own dogged persistence. Now, however, they were finding that the proportion of stolen goods that they were able to recover was much lower than it had been previously. Rumours reached them that much of this plunder was being smuggled abroad, where it would, of course, be much easier to dispose of. A sort of indirect confirmation of this theory was received when some jewellery turned up in London which subsequent investigation showed had been stolen in Paris two months earlier.

“Having had their attention drawn to this illicit cross-Channel trade, the police soon found their suspicions converging upon some of the criminal elements in Rotherhithe and, in particular, upon a notorious villain by the name of Elias Dack, who ran an old inn there called The Cocked Hat. Have you ever heard anything of Dack, Watson?”

“Never.”

“Well, that is perhaps not so surprising, for he has little to do with honest citizens. But in that part of south-east London where his gang holds sway, his name is a byword for cruelty and violence, and strikes instant fear into the breast of anyone that hears it. From his lair at The Cocked Hat – a plague-spot on the face of London – he exercises ruthless control over the district and none dare cross him. Yet, despite his notoriety, the police have never been able to bring any serious charge against him. In the early ’70s, the police were convinced that Dack was the guiding brain behind the crimes they were investigating, yet they could not get near him. Instead, therefore, they began to pick off the outliers of his criminal pack, particularly those who connected Dack with the cross-Channel trade. One of these was Jack Prentice, who was arrested early in ’74, in possession of stolen goods, for which he was convicted and sentenced to two years’ imprisonment. Prentice’s wife informs me that she was shocked by this, as she had no idea that he had been engaged in anything underhand, and I believe her. She seems a decent sort, Watson, and deserves our help.

“Upon Prentice’s release from Pentonville in 1876, his wife made him vow to give up his criminal ways, and abjure all his former associates, especially Dack, whom she says she has always detested. No doubt chastened by his time in prison, Prentice agreed to do as she said. Shortly afterwards, he also turned his back on the sea, became the landlord of The Seven Stars and settled down. There, for the last dozen years or so, he has remained. It is an interesting old inn, Watson, which has stood on that spot since before the time of Shakespeare and Marlowe. Much of it is little changed from those days, although part of the panelling in the tap room is said to be from an eighteenth century man o’ war, and a fine painting of the ship in question hangs on the wall there.

‘‘The Prentices’ children, who are, of course, now grown up, helped them in the house for a time, but they have now both left. The son, William, married a girl from Deptford by the name of Daisy Weekes, and works in a local timber yard. There seems to be some slight ill-feeling between him and his parents, and he hasn’t been in The Seven Stars for several months. The daughter, Lily, married one Teddy Bates, a sail-maker, and Mrs Prentice says she usually sees her at least once every week. The place in the household left vacant by the children’s departure has been filled, partly at least, by the arrival of Maria, a young girl of about eighteen, from Corunna in northern Spain. She apparently arrived in Rotherhithe last summer, in the company of an English sailor who had promised to marry her when they reached London, but who, upon their arrival here, promptly deserted her and set sail for the Far East, leaving her destitute and homeless. Mrs Prentice saw her in the street one day, took pity on her and took her into her own home, where she helps with the cooking, cleaning and other household tasks. Other than this girl, there are no servants in the house. This, then, is the peaceful and settled household from which Jack Prentice has so mysteriously disappeared.

“To come now to recent events: Mrs Prentice informs me that she noted with displeasure that Elias Dack and two of his cronies called in at The Seven Stars one night last week and engaged her husband in conversation. After they had left, she asked him what Dack had wanted.

“‘Nothing special,’ said Prentice, ‘just gossip.’ She did not believe him but, as it was clear he did not wish to discuss the matter further, she did not press the point. A couple of days later, however, on the tenth, there was another unwelcome visitor in the pub, a man of the vilest antecedents, who glories in the name of ‘One-eye’ Vokes. Notorious in the district for his violence and criminality, he is known by everyone to be a sort of vicious emissary for Elias Dack. The ocular shortcoming that has given him his name is the result of a bar-room brawl several years ago, when he was hit in the face with a beer bottle, by one ‘Spider’ Wilkins. Wilkins himself was later found dead in mysterious circumstances, but evidence was lacking, and although the police strongly suspected that Vokes was responsible, no one was ever charged with the murder. After the visit of ‘One-eye’ Vokes to The Seven Stars last week, Mrs Prentice confronted her husband, warning him that if she ever found out that he had taken up his old criminal ways again she would leave him forthwith. Prentice protested his innocence and assured her he had told Vokes he did not want anything to do with him or Dack.

“The following evening, Mrs Prentice went to bed before her husband, but could not sleep. As she lay awake, worrying what he was up to, she heard a tap at the front door and, putting her head out of the bedroom window, she saw that ‘One-eye’ Vokes was standing there. Then her husband came to the door, and spoke to Vokes for some time, but she could not hear any of their conversation. Eventually, Vokes turned away and walked off up the street. When her husband came upstairs shortly afterwards, she asked him what Vokes had wanted.

“‘They wanted me to do something for them,’ he replied, ‘but I told them I’m not interested.’

“On Monday evening of this week, Prentice again loitered downstairs after his wife had gone to bed, and again she did not fall asleep straight away. After a while she heard someone moving about downstairs, and thought she heard voices, so she put on her dressing gown and went to see what was happening. She found her husband alone in the tap room, sitting at a table, writing something on a sheet of paper. On the table next to the paper was an ornate gold ring containing a large purplish stone. As his wife entered the room, Prentice quickly picked up the ring and slipped it into his waistcoat pocket.