Chapter Text
“Copper! One of these days when their backs are turned, huh?”
It isn’t the first threat he’s received in the five months he’s been in here. In fact, it’s not even among the first dozen. His arrival was celebrated by a “welcoming party”, a small handful of the inmates who knew of his identity, his profession.
His past profession.
They snarled a few unsavoury words before dragging him round out of sight of the guards on his first day for a beating he narrowly escaped. After all, even if it was one against four, he still had years of training under his belt. He got away with a black eye and some bruised ribs. Not too bad, all things considered.
He may not be William Murdoch, but he’s still a copper, and one who worked with the great detective at that, and while most people didn’t know who he was at first, word traveled fast. Soon everyone knew of the former constable currently locked up for the murder of a woman’s husband.
Some thought he was a rat, sent in by the great Murdoch himself. That theory was disproven when a gang gave him a thorough beatdown, apparently something they thought would force him out, only to have him turn up again the next day, still very much a real prisoner.
The threats and the attacks only got bolder as time wore on. He broke three ribs in his first two months, fractured a wrist during the third. The guards didn’t do much to help him – even if they once thought they were on the same standing, he’d long since fallen from grace. There was no one to help him.
So, yes, George has gotten used to the threats thrown his way, to the cheap shots to the back of his head or knees when he isn’t paying attention. He’s gotten used to the disgusted stares of the guards (except one, a new lad, he thinks his name is Dunbar or something).
In other words, this one meagre threat shouldn’t bother him.
But it does. Because it comes right before Foster’s claims and his subsequent murder in the coal shed.
And that’s when George wonders if being in here is really the best way to protect Edna. That’s when he starts thinking, maybe I’m out of my depth here.
With a little help from former Chief Constable Giles, George discovers the regimental tattoo on Foster’s shoulder, identical to the one on Archibald Brooks’. He calls on Murdoch, asks for his help, and he can see the relief mixed with hurt on his friend’s face – hurt for all the times the Detective asked to see George and George declining. He never meant to hurt him, but he’s done so anyway, and that’s just an added layer to the guilt on the ex-constable’s shoulders.
George cuts right to the chase, barely stopping to revel in the warmth that the words what have you? stir in his heart. He tells Murdoch about Foster, about his murder and the tattoo indicating they were in the same regiment. Against his better judgment, he confesses his fears about Edna’s safety.
And doesn’t that just backfire spectacularly, because Detective Murdoch is not only hyperintelligent but George’s friend, and he can still tell when the younger man is lying.
“You’re protecting her.”
“Sir, you of all people should understand.”
He doesn’t want to do it. He doesn’t want Murdoch to relive all the past instances where his wife’s life had been in danger, but it’s a strategic move, one to veer them off the current unbearable topic, and it works.
Murdoch agrees to look into it as he walks away.
The guards come to take him back outside – one of them is Dunbar, he notices. Rather tall up close, easily towering over George who is not on the short side at all. He gazes down at George with pity in his eyes and George looks away. He doesn’t like that expression. It reminds him too much of that fateful night in the interview room.
The detective finds the shiv, barely hidden behind a couple sacks of rice, but in a prison there’s not many places to hide things. Still, George wishes the bugger had been a bit more creative. Or better yet, more obvious – why not hide the thing under their pillow?
God, George misses his pillow.
He writes in his journal that night, jotting down the conversation he had with Giles – just Giles, as he insists George calls him – about the relativity of stupidity, noting the dark-haired man who watched them like a hawk once Detective Murdoch left. He writes in barely legible scribbles. After all, no one’s going to read it.
With a sigh, George realizes he’s running out of pages. Right as he was just coming up with a brilliant narration – the tale of a man fleeing injustice, forced to leave a wife and son behind.
A tale that, while a little fanciful and exaggerated, could have been his had Murdoch and the Inspector not found him first.
He wonders if Doctor Ogden might stop by again. She was the one who gave him the journal in the first place.
Unlike her husband, she didn’t give up after a few tries (even though George would be the last to blame the Detective for doing so). She was insistent, stopping by nearly every day to the point where she irritated the guards so much that they forced him to see her.
“I know how much you… like to write,” she said, handing over the leatherbound journal. The artistic rendition on the cover, the high-quality paper – it was not a cheap gift. And George was not about to throw it back in her face.
“We’re thinking of you,” she said as her parting words, a sad smile on her lips. “And William is working very hard to- to get you out. Everyone is.”
He had nothing to say to that.
Back in the present, George finishes his daily notes and starts on brainstorming that narration of his. In a conservative way, of course. No need to take up unnecessary space. Midway through a wonderful, heart-breaking scene where the protagonist and his lovesick wife are reunited in Chicago when a loud clang surprises him. His head darts up, and he comes eye to eye with one of the guards on shift. He thinks his name is Clark.
Clark doesn’t say anything, just stares him down for a good few seconds with a sneer before he shakes his head and resumes patrolling.
George puts the journal away. His motivation is gone, and he feels suddenly uneasy.
The plan is genius in its simplicity. George, with his limited journal capacity, is hesitant to use the last remaining pages on a scheme to uncover a killer, but Giles doesn’t own any sort of journal and won’t be able to get their hands on another for quite some time.
They take bets from other prisoners, a way to try and smoke the killer out. George is threatened a few times but it’s nothing new, and none of it sticks the way the man in the yard’s words did.
“One of these days when their backs are turned, huh?”
He can’t help but wonder if that day is inching closer.
Pearson.
The anomaly was pointed out by Giles, but George thinks he probably would’ve gotten it a few minutes later without help.
Everyone who bet on Pearson was in the yard during Foster’s murder, and none of them could be persuaded to change their bets, no matter the odds.
George asks for Murdoch right away, but he’s busy, on another call. They will have to wait until tomorrow.
And tomorrow can’t come fast enough, George thinks, as he lies on the hard mattress in his cell, the eyes of a person unknown in the shadows drilling holes into his back.
He doesn’t bring out his journal, doesn’t even dare breathe. He hasn’t felt this terrified since… since…
Well, ever.
“You got the inmates to bet on who the killer is?”
He really could have spoken quieter, George thinks, fumbling with the journal in his hands as Giles explains their process with the occasional helpful quip from George.
The Detective nods thoughtfully. “I will look into it right away.” And he moves to leave, but stops, hesitates, then turns back. “George, may I speak with you? Alone?”
George purses his lips, nods. Giles glances between them before wandering off to a bench in the corner while a guard is called over to deal with George and Murdoch’s upcoming conversation.
The guard, McRowley if George remembers correctly, tries to take the journal from him but is usurped by Murdoch, much to his displeasure. That’s one thing taken care of, at least.
In the dimly lit interview room, George’s wrists are cuffed, Murdoch sitting across from him staring at said handcuffs with a guilty look on his face. Like he’s the one who put them on him.
“Sir,” George says, clearing his throat.
Murdoch blinks himself out of his thoughts. “Ah, yes. George, there have been some… developments lately,” he begins. He’s uncharacteristically quiet, closed off, as if worried he’ll say something to offend George.
Or, more likely, set him off.
“We have reason to believe that friends of Archibald Brooks in the army may have killed him, in order to gain access to some kind of… war bounty.” His brow furrows. “A raw diamond, to be exact.”
George whistles despite himself.
Murdoch gives a small, playful scoff, then sobers back up. He explains the new evidence they’ve uncovered, the events that led Murdoch and the Inspector to this conclusion. “It’s a version of the events that’s consistent with the facts,” he finishes, then pauses. “But we need to know if it’s consistent to what you know to be true.”
“…It is,” George says after only a moment’s hesitation, and the admission feels like a weight has been lifted. Only a small amount compared to what he’s been carrying all these months, but a weight, nonetheless.
It seems to do the same to the Detective because his shoulders sag, his expression softens, and now he’s asking George to admit the truth, to admit that he hasn’t killed anyone.
And George feels the last lock on his emotions break, and out tumbles everything.
Dunbar is the one to announce that Murdoch’s allotted ten minutes are up. His voice is firm but kind, not sharp and full of wickedness like most of the other guards.
Murdoch stands and steps around the table, then pats George’s shoulder with a smile. “We’ll get you out of here, George,” he promises in a soft voice. “In the meantime, I’ll have Inspector Brackenreid round up Edna and Simon. Perhaps, if all goes well, we can arrange a visit.”
“‘All goes well’, are you implying I’ll be in here forever, sir?” George teases darkly. He’s gotten used to that sort of thing, gallows humour.
Unfortunately, it looks like the Detective has missed his jesting tone. His eyes grow wide and horrified and he rushes to explain himself, which results in George also explaining himself, which results in another guard that isn’t Dunbar having to step in and practically drag Murdoch from the room.
George doesn’t even have time to ask if bringing Edna here is such a good idea.
He wants to feel excited at the prospect of a visit – somewhere deep down, he knew that Edna could never have it in her to kill anyone, let alone her husband, no matter how awful a man he was – but he can’t help feeling an overwhelming fear as well. Fear for his would-be fiancée, fear for himself.
What will come of Edna and Simon now that he’s given away where they are? What if someone harms them and no one is there to help?
And why has my sense of uneasiness only grown?
Yet underneath all that, barely noticeable, he does feel a tiny bit… relieved.
“One of these days when their backs are turned…”
Because it was a gamble, and he can’t help but feel like he’s done something right after so many months of wrongs. Even if he’s not around to protect them, he can trust in Murdoch and the boys at the station house to do what he couldn’t.
He writes all this down in his journal. He writes it all slowly, deliberately, like he used to, because for once he feels the need to reclaim something from his past. To grasp onto something from his old life and hold on tight.
The uneasiness stays with him, but some of the fear leaks from his mind into words on the page. He feels a growing smile tugging at his lips and it doesn’t go away when the guards announce lights out, when he tucks his journal back under his pillow, when he rests his head and closes his eyes.
For the first time in months, it feels like everything might just be going in the right direction.
But the universe has never been kind to George Crabtree.