Murder in Grub Street by Bruce Alexander

terrible massacre in Grub Street. Even before it had been properly reported, it was the subject of much talk in the street. I well remember that on our walk from Preston’s, Sir John was detained by a few of the gentry who wished to know details of the matter. No matter how outlandish or how pertinent their questions, he forestalled discussion with a mild phrase or two. “All in due time,” he might say; or, “My court is ever open to the public,” et cetera. To those who simply yelled out to him as he passed by, “What about Grub Street?” or, “How many killed?” or some such, he gave no true answer, but simply a curt shake of his head or a disapproving wave of his hand. He was, I could see, quite troubled by those rude intrusions; such was the price he paid for the “eminence” of which he himself had boasted.
    As we walked in from the street, our way took us within sight of the prisoner, John Clayton — or Petrus, as he would be called. He was attempting to dress himself in breeches and stockings, and so on (clothes more fitting for an appearance in court than a bloodstained nightshirt). Sir John seemed to have no interest. He had tried to persuade the prisoner to talk to him at least once since our return from Grub Street — all to no avail. It was evident that he felt that further efforts of this sort would be useless, at least for the present.
    Once settled in his chambers, he sent me off to fetch Mr. Bailey, and I found, not to my surprise, that the prisoner had completed his dressing, and now sat sulking in worn and ill-matched garb. Sir John put me to work with the copy of The Countryman* Calendar borrowed from Samuel Johnson. His instructions I thought curious: “Search it for opinions, Jeremy — opinions of any sort. We must try to get some notion of how this fellow’s mind works in its more reasonable phases.” And so, sitting on the bench before Sir John’s door, I began rummaging through the book, looking for I knew not quite what. There was, in a sense, a superabundance of opinions — on the blue of a rare cloudless summer sky, the nesting of birds in an autumn rain, and the midnight conversations of nightingales. In short, the poems written by Clayton were much as Dr. Johnson had said: descriptive rather than philosophic, yet filled with verbal felicities of the most arresting sort. I read, rummaged, and ransacked — Mr. Marsden came and went; young Constable Cowley made an appearance—yet when Sir John called me in and asked what I had discovered, I was able to offer precious little.
    “He does not seem to like doctors,” said I, “and he loathes confinement.”
    “Well, in those,” said Sir John, “he is joined by the entire population. Yet I suppose it does give some slight support to the tale told Johnson by the gentleman from Somerset.” Then, pulling a face: “Bah! An altogether bad business, this. The man is incompetent.”
    Such was the magistrate’s frame of mind as he made to begin that day’s proceedings. The crowd that had gathered there was quite the largest I had seen up to that time in the Bow Street Court. It was loud and a bit unruly, as interest ran high in the matter. Among the usual assemblage of layabouts and dregs from Covent Garden were others — distinguished gentlemen and their ladies; others in printing and publishing, such as Mr. Boyer and his young partner Mr. Nicholson, Mr. Davies, and Mr. Evans; and finally, front and center, Dr. Samuel Johnson.
    It soon became evident that Sir John meant not to conduct this in the usual way, but rather as a further inquiry into the case, a sort of hearing in open court. The prisoner was not called forward to face his accusers but brought in unbound to sit between Mr. Bailey and Constable Cowley; Clayton behaved quite reasonably taking interest in the proceedings, and giving close attention to what was said. He appeared ready at last to respond.
    Sir John first called Constable Cowley to give his account of the