"In broad daylight?" Agar said, aghast.
"Why not?" Pierce said.
The following day, Pierce and Agar watched the midday routine of the office. At one o'clock, the London Bridge Station was crowded with passengers coming and going; porters hauling luggage behind elegant travelers on their way to coaches; hawkers shouting refreshments for sale; and three or four policemen moving around, keeping order and watching for buzzers--- pickpockets--- since train stations were becoming their new favorite haunt. The dipper would nail his quarry as he boarded the train, and the victim would not discover the robbery until he was well out of London.
The association of pickpockets with train stations became so notorious that when William Frith painted one of the most famous pictures of his generation, "The Railway Station," in 1862, the chief focus of the composition was two detectives pinching a thief.
Now the London Bridge Station had several Metropolitan Police constables. And the railway companies had private guards as well.
"It's fair aswarm with miltonians," Agar said unhappily, looking around the station platforms.
"Never mind that," Pierce said. He watched the railway office.
At one o'clock, the clerks clambered down the iron stairs, chattering among themselves, off to lunch. The traffic manager, a stern gentleman in muttonchop whiskers, remained inside. The clerks were back at two o'clock, and the office routine resumed.
The next day, the manager went to lunch but two of the clerks remained behind, skipping lunch.
By the third day, they knew the pattern: one or more of the men in the office went to lunch for an hour at one o'clock, but the office was never left unattended. The conclusion was clear.
"No daylight gammon," Agar said.
"Perhaps Sunday," Pierce said, thinking aloud.
In those days--- and indeed to the present day--- the British railway system strongly resisted operations on the Sabbath. It was considered unnecessary and unseemly for any company to do business on Sunday, and the railways in particular had always shown an oddly moralistic bent. For example, smoking on railway carriages was forbidden long after smoking became a widespread custom in society; a gentleman who wished to enjoy a cigar was obliged to tip the railroad porter--- another forbidden act--- and this state of affairs continued, despite the intense pressure of public opinion, until 1868, when Parliament finally passed a law forcing the railroads to allow passengers to smoke.
Similarly, although everyone agreed that the most God-fearing men sometimes needed to travel on the Sabbath, and although the popular custom of weekend excursions provided ever more pressure for Sunday schedules, the railroads fought stubbornly against this trend. In 1854, the South Eastern Railway ran only four trains on Sunday, and the other line that used London Bridge, the London & Greenwich Railway, ran only six trains, less than half the usual number.
Pierce and Agar checked the station the following Sunday, and found a double guard posted outside the traffic manager's office; one jack stationed himself near the door, and the second was positioned near the foot of the stairs.
"Why?" Pierce asked when he saw the two guards. "Why, in God's name, why?"
In later courtroom testimony, it emerged that the South Eastern Railway management changed hands in the fall of 1854. Its new owner, Mr. Willard Perkins, was a gentleman of philanthropic bent whose concern for the lower classes was such that he introduced a policy of employing more people at all positions on the line, "in order to provide honest work for those who might otherwise be tempted into lawlessness and improvident promiscuity." The extra personnel were hired for this reason alone; the railway never suspected a robbery, and indeed Mr. Perkins was greatly shocked when his line was eventually robbed.
It is also true that at this time the South Eastern Railway was trying to build new access lines into downtown London, and this caused the displacement of many families and the destruction of their houses. Thus this philanthropic endeavor had a certain public relations aspect in the minds of the railway owners.
"No gammon on Sunday," Agar said, looking at the two guards. "Perhaps Christmas?"
Pierce shook his head. It was possible that security might be relaxed on Christmas Day, but they could not depend on that. "We need something routine," he said.
"There's nothing to be done by day"
"Yes," Pierce said. "But we don't know the full night routine. We never had an all-night watch." At night the station was deserted, and loiterers and tramps were briskly ordered off by the policemen making their rounds.
"They'll shoo away a canary," Agar said. "And perhaps collar him as well."
"I was thinking of a canary in a lurk," Pierce said. A concealed man could remain all night in the station.
"Clean Willy? "
"No," Pierce said. "Clean Willy is a mouth and a flat, without a downy bone in his body. He's glocky."
"It's true he's glocky," Agar said.
Clean Willy, dead at the time of the trial, was noted in courtroom testimony to be of "diminished faculties of reasoning"; this was reported by several witnesses. Pierce himself said, "We felt we could not trust him to do the surveillance. If he were apprehended, he would put down on us--- reveal our plans--- and never know the difference."
"Who shall we have instead?" Agar said, looking around the station.
"I was thinking of a skipper," Pierce said.
"A skipper?" Agar said, in surprise.
"Yes," Pierce said. "I think a skipper would do nicely. Do you happen to know of a bone skipper?"