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London, my city.
It was a monstrous place.
Commerce and trade had made it that way
and filled its ever-expanding streets with the rural poor, and the new urban rich.
It was also an anonymous place where men could gather secretly to satisfy their particular appetites.
First, then, moistening well with spittle his instrument,
he pointed, he introduced it, as I could plainly discern,
not only from its direction and my losing sight of it,
but by the writhing, twisting, and soft, murmured complaints of the young sufferer.
And now, passing one hand round his minion's hips,
he got hold of his red-topped ivory toy, that stood perfectly stiff.
This he diverted himself with, whilst with the other he wantoned with his hair and
leaning forward over his back, drew his face towards his, so as to receive a long breathed kiss.
It was no wonder I felt compelled to make a proposal to parliament
to help remedy society's growing problems.
I resolved to turn away from my celebrated works of fiction
and to accept the role of magistrate of Westminster.
And with my brother John, blind since youth,
I resolved to create a new organisation that would bring law and order to the city's streets.
London was in need of a police force.
- Episodio 2 - Transcript by Evarin
Traduzione: Bally o Derma? Synchro e revisione: AlexandraD
Respect for the houses of the Lord was in decline,
and men of God themselves were not safe from the violence of the streets.
Chiesa di Sant'Anna Soho
The body prostrate on its front.
Much blood.
It looks like he was stabbed in the belly.
Face contorted with pain, one imagines.
If he was stabbed in the stomach,
it will have taken him many hours to die.
Exactly as I found him, first thing.
- Mrs Smithie. - Mr Fielding.
When do you open the church?
Usually at dawn, but this morning my grandson was ill.
And when you arrived, he was dead?
His rooms are this way.
- Mr Carne, Mr Welch. Would you attend to the removal of the body? - Straight away, Mr Fielding.
Any of the Reverend's acquaintances suggest themselves as candidates for his murder, madam?
The Reverend Cavendish employed me to sweep the floors, and renew the candles, Mr Fielding.
I got no opinions.
It seems you consider him justly unpopular.
The Reverend was the victim of an earlier crime.
Blackmail.
You knew of the flaw in the Reverend's character?
I knew of his sin. Saw him committing it once.
Him and some young fellow in the vestry with their hands down each other's breeches.
Any one of late who's attracted the Reverend's attentions?
Oh, yes. One I seen him with lately. Arguing.
Like the Right Reverend was too filled to busting with jealousy.
Name of William something. Flynn! William Flynn.
That abominable sin, which Christians preferred not to name,
was punishable by death.
Yet sodomites still sought each other out.
Well, here we are.
Bookshop... my arse!
DRYBUTTER'S BOOKSHOP Saffron Hill
Come on, come on.
Part of your purpose, Mr Pentlow, is to know everything that goes on in these streets.
I'm sorry, sir. But I'm a family man. These matters are alien to me.
Though you know three dozen whores by name.
Come on, come on.
- Mr Drybutter. - Ah, Messers Fielding.
Rather late, but if you require a book, sirs, I have the best collection in London.
We're here in connection with a murder. Did you know the Reverend Erasmus Cavendish?
- No. - He owned a book purchased in your shop.
Be assured, Mr Drybutter, our interest here is in information only.
Be careful in the dark, gentlemen.
Their meeting places were called "molly houses" - clubs where they could drink, dance and commit unnatural acts.
Move away from the door.
That night, we encountered two of the most notorious.
Peace, gentlemen. No laws are being broken here.
We're looking for a William Flynn. Is he here?
Samuel Drybutter, known as Miss Sukie.
Is any of you gentlemen acquainted with him? - Anyone know where we'd find him?
And one John Cooper who, for 20 years, had lived as Princess Seraphina.
What's Flynn done now?
A man has been murdered.
A man of God, in his own church.
Oh! Why Flynn?
- The churchman was a Jesuit. - Oh.
- What? - A bugger, sir.
How charming, that a magistrate should make so much effort on his behalf.
- I believe his brother is a member of Parliament. - Ah. Of course!
That is not the reason for this investigation.
I'll look upstairs, sir.
- Oh! - You'll need light. Those stairs are treacherous.
Who was the churchman? Which church?
Erasmus Cavendish. St Anne's, Soho.
Oh, Missie Anne! Knew her by reputation.
Would your worships care for a drink? I can offer you some wine, or port.
Or I can send out for some more beer.
- What character is William Flynn? - Well, let's just say, his yard really is a yard, I'm told.
No experience of it personally, sad to tell.
What are you doing?
Get out! You bastard!
Cuff hold of him. - Come 'ere, you bastard!
Now, think me unimaginative, but hiding under the bed, not the most innocent of behaviour, that.
- I was asleep! The noise fright me. - Kiss my arse!
What, you sleep under the bed? Fetch him up here.
- William Flynn? - His name's Thomas Deacon.
A respectable fellow, I promise you, a manservant to a merchant in Ludgate Hill.
No murderer, for sure. - I didn't know you'd come about a murder.
- Then why did you attempt to hide? - I was scared you'd put me in jail.
Are you more likely to be apprehended for misdeeds than others here?
He has past experience, sir, and has no trust in justice.
- What kind of experience? - He spend six months in Newgate for attempted sodomy.
Before even he passed through the prison gates he was pilloried for a day.
- Were you guilty? - He was pelted with shit, sirs, and dead cats.
So you can understand, Mr Fielding, why he would be so afraid to run and hide.
Even to be found in such a place might be construed, by a less fair and reasonable magistrate, as attempted buggery.
I know Mr Deacon, sir. I can vouchsafe for his good character.
Did you know of his offence and imprisonment, Mr Carne?
He's spoken about it briefly.
And you didn't find cause to rethink your assessment of his character?
Do you know the Reverend Cavendish? - Who?
But I believe Mr Deacon is acquainted with a William Flynn.
I know that shit-sack son of a bitch only too well, sir.
Twas the son of a whore caused my arrest!
Maybe you can enlighten us as to his whereabouts?
At this time of night, the son of a bitch will be down the sodomites' walk.
- Where is this damnable place to be found? - At Moorfields, I believe, John.
Near the walls of Bedlam.
In 1726, there had been an attempt to close the molly houses.
Three men were hanged for sodomy.
By the 1750's, executions were rare.
But the mollies still lived in fear of the mob.
SODOMITES' WALK Moorfields, The City
You seem nervous, Mr Carne.
I am merely cold, Mr Fielding.
- You see the rogue? - I see him, at the barrel.
Get him, Bill!
Get up! Come 'ere!
On your feet!
I dont' know what you imagine has transpired here tonight, sir.
But for my part, my presence is entirely godly.
I enjoy a stroll in the moonlight.
Throw him in the compter, Mr Welch.
We'll talk to him in the morning.
See to it your friend stays out of trouble, Mr Carne.
This investigation was a delicate matter.
The clergyman came from a powerful family.
And immediately his brother, a Member of Parliament, was anxious to meet.
You witnessed Flynn in the vestry. Yet you told no-one.
Who should I have told, sir? You? And if I'd come to you with tales of unnatural acts, what would you have done?
He was a rich and powerful man. His brother, a member of parliament for some place in Scotland.
For all I know, the lot of them Macaronies, sticking up for each other.
For all I know, you, too, sir, if you'll forgive me.
You seem to have harboured a great deal of resentment.
That man stood in that pulpit, telling the rest of us how to secure our place in Heaven,
knowing what the Lord God had done to the cities of the plain.
Knowing full well he was going to burn in Hell.
Sir Charles Cavendish.
Sir Charles, our deepest sympathy.
Fielding. I understand you've arrested some rogue?
Though we have yet to establish his guilt.
- I wish this matter to be resolved swiftly. - You are aware your brother was the victim of blackmail?
A matter which, under no circumstances, is to be mentioned in public.
Understand, Fielding, if there is the slightest whiff of a scandal in this affair,
I will find ways to make your life difficult indeed. - It is our intention to bring your brother's killer to justice,
as swiftly as we can. - Don't be impertinent!
Understand this also, I see no purpose to you or your troublesome company.
Fail in your simple task in this case and your instrument of tyranny will be strangled at birth.
Is that understood?
Another fuckster.
- Well, I suppose he has his electors to think of, Henry. - Yes, all twelve of them.
London had an enormous appetite for scandal. Catchpenny pamphlets fed it.
And my own Covent Garden Journal was read by thousands.
Those in power had reason to fear the written word.
Which, as I knew, could be a terrible weapon.
Messrs Fielding, such an honour.
- Who are you? - John Hill, Mr Fielding. A great pleasure to make your acquaintance.
He's a Grub Street hack.
- Oh, God preserve us. - A pamphleteer, sir.
A great admirer of your work. Even your earlier, theatrical endeavours.
- Oh, you're very kind. - I hear your people arrested someone last night at Moorfields.
Was he an associate from the demi-monde?
Was it une crime passionelle between buggering lovers? - People? We have no people.
The Ethiopian isn't one of them, these people you don't have, then?
I'm sorry, Mr Fielding. I was detained.
Well, Mr Welch is busy, your muscles will have to do. I require you down in the compter.
And I require you, Mr Hill, to fuck off!
Recognise this, Mr Flynn?
No.
- How well did you know the Reverend Cavendish? - Who?
We have a witness who saw you with him, so don't waste our time.
- I didn't know him well. - Sodomy, what's your opinion of it?
- That of any Christian. - You're aware the Reverend Cavendish had an exploitable weakness.
- No. - Oh, come on! It's not a closely-guarded secret.
You know full well the Reverend Cavendish was a sodomite and I believe you to be a sodomite yourself.
Do you know where I was last night? I was swiving a whore, sirs.
A whore with tits. - Then went for a stroll down the sodomites' walk.
Went for a stroll, yes. I don't know nothing about sodomites.
Then why is your name so renowned amongst the mollies?
Evidently you make a habit of extorting money from the sinful.
Mr Flynn, a man is dead, murdered.
He was a buggeranto, a foppish Macaroni.
He was also a preternatural fornicator and a religious hypocrite.
I don't much care who killed him. What I care about, is telling his insufferable brother we've solved this crime.
Someone must swing for it and you will do.
Mr Fielding!
Sir, if a man ain't a killer, but took advantage of a situation just to make himself some money,
what would his punishment be?
- This letter is in your hand. - It's true.
The Reverend did pay me from time to time, so I'd be discreet about his peccadilloes.
But that's the proof that I didn't kill him. He was a source of income.
What do you think, Mr Carne? Blackmailer or murderer?
Or both?
- Both. - You been seen, Mr Carne.
Last night weren't the first time you been down the sodomites' walk, yanking on your shaft.
You and your pretty Miss Kitten. - You're in enough trouble, Mr Flynn,
without impugning the honour of a decent man.
Cadaverous buggerantos everywhere, Mr Fielding.
City's infested.
- That man is a liar to the core of his being. - And a case against him.
Not now, Mary! For heaven's sake.
A case against him can be assembled. But perhaps other possibilities should be considered.
The victim was a degenerate hypocrite, whom everyone seems to have hated.
Does it really matter who it was stuck him like a pig?
- Yes. - Yes, yes...of course, you're right.
Why kill the Reverend if he was paying him? No, Flynn is a rogue. But not, I think, a murderer.
Henry, we must speak of Mr Carne.
Mr Carne is an excellent fellow. Clever, honest.
He's a Ganymede, Henry! It was clear last night, and clearer still this morning.
- Perhaps you misjudge him. - The misjudgement is yours.
The man's proved himself entirely untrustworthy.
What is it? St Paul to the Romans, "the men, leaving the natural use of the woman,
"burned in their lust one toward..." - "..And they who commit such sins are worthy of death."
Should we kill Mr Carne?
But the drift of God's opinion seems evident.
Do as you think best.
They took to their pretty heels!
As though we'd come to stick our truncheons right up their arses.
Can't be, Mr Pentlow. Would have had 'em lining up for arrest.
Hey, serious, though...
If we went to Moorfields once a week, half an hour, we'd soon fill Newgate.
Perhaps you're right, Bill.
It's an indignity, all these buggers doing as they please as though we didn't count.
Mind you, careful you don't go and slip in the mud,
can you imagine crawling around on all fours, your arse stuck in the air...
God help us!
Terrible thing, the murder of a clergyman.
And potentially a public scandal.
Tongues love to wag. Which greatly concerns his brother.
I can imagine, Mr Fielding.
- Equally public, then, is the test of our skills. - I understand, sir.
Now it seems you have a knowledge of the demi-monde much greater than your fellows...
..most likely of advantage to us in this investigation.
- You think it ain't that troll Flynn, sir? - No. Put what you know to good use.
I'll do what I can, sir.
Daniel, Daniel...
Daniel, the devil dogs us, all our lives. We all have temptations.
We all know the attractions of sin.
But a man like Cavendish, whose office stands for something pure, who has a duty,
yet abandons that struggle. Such a man is contemptible.
Isn't he?
And for me, also it's a... well, it's a practical matter.
The world must know that Mr Fielding's people, unlike all their predecessors in the struggle to uphold the law,
are unimpeachable, incorruptible, beyond reproach.
But God is forgiving, a man can atone even for a mortal sin.
And if God can be forgiving...
Yes, sir. Thank you, Mr Fielding.
A good investigator learns all there is to know about his subject.
And so I red the unexpurgated edition of Fanny Hill, to see what I might uncover.
I have given Mr Carne a task.
Good.
We should return to the interrogation of Flynn.
I am reading this extraordinary text. Listen to this:
"Slipping, then, aside, the young lad's shirt, "and tucking it up under his clothes behind, "he showed to the open air..."
- Henry! - "Those globular, fleshy eminences that compose the Mount Pleasants of Rome,
"and which now, withal the narrow vale that intersect them, "stood displayed and exposed...
"..to his attack." - I understood you not to be an admirer of Mr Cleland's book, Henry.
Nor am I. But Mr Drybutter's edition is more depraved than I can imagine.
Fine words from a man who deals in murder.
The good book would have us believe that there are depravities even greater than that.
The sin of Sodom. I'm familiar with my Bible, Henry.
Perhaps there are parts of the Bible wives should not be encouraged to read.
Is God merciful, Mary? Or will we burn in eternal flames for our fleshly weaknesses?
He that is without sin among you, let him cast the first...
You and I have committed the occasional sin.
Jamaica Mary!
If it wasn't Flynn, who else might have done for the churchman?
Tom's upstairs.
Waiting for you.
Maybe he'll have some ideas.
They don't think Flynn's the killer.
- Oh? Who is it? - That's the puzzle. That's what my work's all about.
Mr Fielding, John, the blind one, says I can especially help catch him, this damned assassin.
But it's not as if I can go from molly house to molly house,
"Hello, gentlemen, I'm looking for a murderer. Is it you?"
Mr Fielding... says I got to choose between sin and redemption.
- Hard choice. - The sin is you, Tom.
I know. Please don't leave Miss Kitten again, Jamaica Mary.
God's truth, I'd rather the stocks, and the risk of a hanging, and be with you, than live safe but lonely.
Look at Princess Seraphina...
20 years she's been telling the world to kiss her arse, she ain't dead yet.
Look at Miss Sukie, molly house over her shop, spitting in their rancid eyes.
- But I can't be like them, Tom. - Nor me.
Don't want to be a damned hero. I just want to be with you.
Hey...hey... Choose tomorrow.
- Sir Charles. - Ah.
I'm told, Fielding, that my brother's murderer has yet to be dispatched to Newgate.
Alas, sir, the man is innocent.
- We will find the devil who is guilty. - We could charge Flynn with blackmail.
I must have failed to make myself clear, I will have a hanging, or you will lose the funds which Parliament so foolishly entrusts to you.
- Really? - We must have failed to made ourselves clear, Sir Charles.
A man will hang, for sure. But only if he's guilty of the crime.
You are an upstart playwright and a blind fool.
You will regret antagonising me.
Not sure it's wise, if you'll pardon me, Mr Fielding, to make an enemy of a politician.
If the pompous arse wants war, we'll give it to him.
I trust, Henry, we have a plan of campaign?
Miss Sukie. I ain't got time for this.
You broke that boy's heart, Jamaica Mary.
Do it again, and it'll be your legs get broken.
He shouldn't love me so much.
And my name's Daniel.
And I don't need a coat.
A gift, Daniel.
♪ If the fops of the town upbraid us for an unnatural trade
♪ We value not man nor maid
♪ But among our own selves we'll be free.
♪ We'll kiss and we'll swive, behind me you'll drive ♪ And we will contrive new ways for lechery,
♪ New ways for lechery
♪ How sweet is the pleasant sin?
♪ With a boy about sixteen... ♪ - You look like a half-wit milksop.
You look beautiful.
♪ ..And a countenance like a rose. ♪
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, The love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.
And with you.
The vows you are about to take are made in the presence of God, who is judge of all and knows all the secrets of our hearts.
Miss Kitten, will you take Jamaica Mary to be your wife?
Will you love her, comfort her, honour and protect her, and, forsaking all others, be faithful to her as long as you both shall live?
I will.
Jamaica Mary, will you take Miss Kitten to be your wife?
Will you love her, comfort her, honour and protect her, and, forsaking all others, be faithful to her as long as you both shall live?
I don't know about forsaking all others...
♪ Here we will enjoy the simpering boy ♪ And with him we'll toy
♪ The Devil may take the Froes, ♪ The Devil may take the froes... ♪
Who else might have had reason to spill the Reverend's innards on the floor of his church?
So, you accept my innocence?
Sir, you see why it couldn't have been me?
Who told you it was me? Which nancy crack-brained bastard pointed his finger at me?
- What was her name? - Mrs Smithie. The man's maidservant.
- So you know the woman. - I think you'll find she weren't so fond of Reverend Cavendish.
- Are you accusing her? - You can't believe nothing that woman says about me, Mr Fielding.
Not a damnable word.
Are you all right?
Do you want a drink?
The molly houses were their own kingdom, with strange rituals and a love of unchristian magic.
To my intense surprise, I learned, from an account by my fellow writer James Dalton,
that parodies of weddings were regularly performed
and that these ungodly ceremonies concluded with an extraordinary ritual in which one of the betrothed sodomites gave birth.
Thomas Deacon, you are so damnably pretty.
And I am going to fuck you till it makes the devil blush.
The housekeeper, Mrs Smithie, had deliberately lied.
I wonder what else her hatred for the Reverend's sin might have caused her to do.
Mrs Smithie, you were very quick to point the finger of blame at William Flynn.
I got no sympathy for blackmailers.
For every sodomite on his way to the fire, there's an innocent man, false accused.
You deliberately set a magistrate on a false trail.
I'm compelled to wonder whether antipathy to Flynn was your only motive.
- You can't think I killed him! - You loathed and hated him, Mrs Smithie.
- But I didn't kill him! - Mr Welch!
- Madam. - No, no. NO! - You will hang for this.
- No, wait...did William Flynn false accuse someone close to you? - Yes! He near ruined the life of my nephew.
But you leave him alone, sir. He's a fine young man, Mr Fielding.
Manservant to a merchant in Ludgate.
Morning... sinner.
I wish I could sleep till noon. But the Fieldings drive us like slaves.
Thought you'd made your choice.
I don't know yet what I'm going to do, Tom.
And your master at Ludgate must expect you early.
What are you doing for money?
Tom? You ain't surviving on the generosity of Sukie Drybutter.
I make do.
- What by selling your arse to Macaronies. - So arrest me.
- Are you going to stop? - Devil take you, it pays better than service!
- Forsaking all others! - Forsaking?
It don't mean nothing. Normally, my arse don't even come into it, they just want a tug.
You got no damned place to be jealous!
It's you who makes me so unhappy, you made me lose my job.
Cos of you I was earning guineas from that rancid clergyman slobbering at my prick.
Which rancid clergyman?
Dan... Don't start thinking you're a constable first.
Where you going, Dan?
What you gonna do?
I am a constable first, Tom. They trust me. And they count on me.
I am one of Mr Fielding's people. - They'll send me to the gallows, Dan.
I was so unhappy.
Felt like I was dead, without you.
And he was kind to me at first.
Wiped my tears. Bought me ale.
So I ended up telling him things I shouldn't have told.
Dog's meat starts saying how he ought to tell Mr Fielding.
About you. About how one of his men's a molly.
I couldn't let him do that.
- Where is Mr Carne? - I've no idea, Mr Fielding.
You are troubled, brother.
Stand aside, move out the way.
I assure you, gentlemen, there is nothing of interest upstairs.
Stay where you are, or I'll arrest you for lewd conduct.
Is Thomas Deacon here?
Please Mr Fielding, what can I do to help you?
Mr Carne, he was questioning me about things.
Don't go jumping to no conclusions.
Thomas Deacon, I hereby execute a warrant of arrest upon you, in the name of his Majesty King George II,
for the murder of the Reverend Erasmus Cavendish.
Daniel... Daniel!
The public eagerness for scandal was the very livelihood of the Grub Street hacks.
As was evidence of a terrible moral malaise.
But pamphleteers such as John Hill had their uses, if our cause was threatened.
The true adventures of the Reverend Dr Ganymede, being the unnatural story and anecdotes of a celebrated sodomite,
the Reverend Erasmus Cavendish, lately murdered.
My gratitude, Mr Fielding, for all your assistance.
I hear Sir Charles has retreated to his estate in Scotland.
I hear there is a further chapter in this terrible affair.
One of your runners attempted to abscond with the assassin.
Mr Carne has, of course, been dismissed. No, we were wrong to put our trust in such a man.
We hoped and expected too much. But in every barrel of apples...
For his replacement we have doubled the stringency of our requirement.
And that is all you will say, if you wish in future to be taken into our confidence.
They are always disappointing, aren't they, sirs, these blackamoors.
Most public hangings took place in Tyburn, at the western end of Oxford Street.
Thousands would turn out to watch the condemned go to their deaths.
Hang him, hang him!
IS IT NOT KNOWN WHAT HAPPENED TO PRINCESS SERAPHINA
IN 1777 SAMUEL DRYBUTTER WAS ATTACKED BY A MOB AND FLED TO PARIS
Our small band of Runners was now smaller still, by one.
But we had made a start in bringing criminals to justice.
And we knew that our exploration of the city's demi-monde must not distract us from our main task,
to protect London from the well organised, utterly ruthless gangs of men, fearless of the law, who still controlled our streets.