Corpse Thief

by Michael Arnold

  “Then Brommett should watch his mouth.”

  “Why so nervous, Mister Totti?”

  The Italian blasted air through a red-tipped nose that was prominent at the bridge. “Have you read the broadsides and those,” he tapped the side of his head, “pazzo little pamphlets? Murders on the streets. Murders committed by foreigners. And now you come to ask me about the Benandanti?” His gaze jumped to the door. “It will be a rabble soon, bringing more than questions.”

  “Information,” Hawke said, trying to banish any impatience from his tone. “That is all I want from you. I give you my word.” He smiled. “Though I suppose the word of a vagabond is not worth a great deal.”

  The Italian let the tiniest flicker of amusement cross his face. “You are a friend of Ansell’s?” When Hawke nodded, he said, “Then I apologise for the insult.”

  “No matter,” Hawke waved him away. “Can you assist?”

  Totti seemed to consider the request for a few silent moments. He rubbed his free hand over a deeply lined brow, then massaged the large bridge of his nose with thumb and forefinger. In the end he took a slow breath and said, “Good Walkers. That is what they called them.”

  “That is what who called them?” Hawke pressed, nonplussed.

  “The folk of Friuli, in the north.”

  “Of Italy?”

  “Sì.” Totti leaned against a wooden pillar from which hung an array of tools. He was beginning to relax a touch, though he looked unlikely to relinquish the weapon.

  “You hail from Friuli?” Hawke asked, recalling Brommett’s surety in referring him to this row of unassuming businesses in the heart of London’s burgeoning Italian community.

  Totti confirmed that he did. “I have knowledge of my people. Of our shared past. It is a particular passion of mine.” He gave a mirthless chuckle, showing teeth that were small and white. “You understand, our land has been dominated by others for generations. The Spanish, the Austrians and the French have all taken their turn. All fed from the trough. We, the common people, must remember our history if we are ever to forge a future.” He moved to one of his workbenches, upon which perched a pewter goblet. He took it, sipped slowly, then said, “The Good Walkers are long dead.”

  Apparently not, Hawke thought. “So tell me about them.”

  “What do you want to know?”

  “Everything.”

  “Let me see.” Totti gnawed at the inside of his mouth as he dredged long-silted memories, then said, “They were strongest two - perhaps three - centuries ago. The Benandanti claimed to travel out of their bodies while sleeping.”

  “To do battle with Malandanti.”

  “Indeed,” Totti said, clearly impressed. “They believed the witches would spoil the crop. The Walkers would fight them, wielding stalks of fennel, in order to ensure a successful harvest.”

  “And these witches carried sticks of sorghum?”

  Totti nodded. “Sì.”

  “What did they look like, the Good Walkers?”

  Totti laughed at that. “Look like? They did not have wings, if that is what you are asking. Nor horns, nor tails, nor cloven feet. Benandanti were believed to have been born with a caul on their head.” He sketched a halo above his own skull. “The fluid in which a foetus resides while inside the womb. The presence of the caul at birth gave them their power. Their ability to take part in the night battles. To the eye of the man in the street, they are no different to the rest of us.”

  Then, Hawke thought, he was looking for a truly tiny needle in the largest haystack of all. Just another stranger lost within London’s sprawling embrace. “You say they are extinct, Mister Totti. What became of them?”

  Totti shrugged as though it were obvious. “The Inquisition. They hunted down the Good Walkers, tried them as heretics and Satanists. Exterminated the cult.” He was probably an inch or two taller than the Englishman, and he peered intently down that crimsoned nose as if attempting to read Hawke’s thoughts. “This is a strange interest indeed. Perverse, even. What brings you here?”

  Hawke knew he should not risk offering any more detail. It would do him no good if Szekely got wind of his involvement in the case. And yet his formidable employer would get to hear far worse tales should Hawke return to Ruthven empty handed. He swallowed hard, throat feeling suddenly constricted, and made a decision. “The murder to which you referred.”

  The Italian frowned. “The story told in the penny bloods?”

  “The corpse was discovered wrapped in fennel and sorghum.”

  Totti’s dark eyes widened. He mouthed an oath in his native tongue. “And you believe the Good Walkers responsible? They fought malevolent witches, Signore Hawke. If this is the cult resurrected,” he gave a sardonic smile, “then perhaps your victim is where they belong.”

  “You will recall that the victim was a child,” Hawke said brusquely. “A little girl.”

  That gave Totti pause. A look of shame rippled over his strong features. “Of course. Fear makes a man speak without consideration.”

  “Fear?”

  “I have always cause for fear in this city, Signore. The summer riots had nothing to do with my people, and yet men of darker complexion were still made targets of the mob’s fury. It is always thus.” He rubbed thin fingers over his lips. “Now this murder may bring the wolf to our very door.” He took another sip from the goblet, grunting softly as a thought evidently dawned. “If the Benandanti have truly returned then you have precious little time, for their activities were limited.”

  “To?” Hawke prompted. “By?”

  “Quattuor anni tempora,” Totti intoned. “Ember Days.”

  Hawke was suddenly back in church. A young lad, full of life, full of promise, learning scripture and revelling in each new day. “Ember?” he repeated slowly, the word echoing in his mind like a shout across a deep valley. “Set aside for fasting and prayer, yes?”

  “You have it,” Totti said. “Four separate occasions of three days within the same week, equidistant in the circuit of the year, reflecting the four seasons. These four times were the only opportunity for the night battles. The only time they could take place. If your killer is truly Benandanta...”

  “He may only be active on Ember Days,” Hawke completed the train of thought. “But when do they occur?”

  “Sant Crux, Lucia, Cineres, Charismata Dia,” Totti intoned in barely a whisper. “Ut sit in angariâ quarta sequens feria.”

  “I will require a little help, Mister Totti.”

  “Fasting days and Emberings,” the Italian switched to an English equivalent of the rhyme, “be Lent, Whitsun, Holyrood, and Lucy.” He gnawed a fingernail as he considered his own implication. “When was the child murdered?”

  Hawke shrugged. “She was badly decomposed.”

  “For the sake of argument, let us indulge your flight of fancy, and say it occurred in September, during the Holyrood Embertide.”

  “That would work.”

  “Then the next battle,” he arched an eyebrow, “if the Benandanti are really to blame...”

  “Saint Lucy’s Day,” Hawke cut in. He frowned. “We did not make a great matter of it in my home town.”

  Totti said, “Santa Lucia has just passed. Two days ago, in fact. Thus, the final Embertide for this year falls next week.”

  A chill traced its icy progress along Hawke’s spine. “The Emberings are three days within the same week?” His mind tumbled now. “Which three days?”

  “Always the Wednesday, the Friday and the Saturday,” Totti said. “But wait, Signore, you are stumbling blindly into assumption.”

  “Four days. I have four days to fathom this affair.”

  Totti held up staying hands as if he calmed a skittish colt. “Consider the matter with care, Signore, I beg you. It is madness to suggest any cause for this deed beyond common wickedness.”

  “Fennel and sorghum,” Hawke retorted tersely. “The torn body of a young girl entombed in their stalks. Tell me what is common in tha
t.” Totti held his gaze, inhaled, but his words never came. Hawke made to leave. He had to get back to Bow Street. Ruthven needed to be warned, to expect more carnage on the streets of the capital. The following Wednesday, to be exact. He was already walking towards the workshop door when he called over his shoulder. “Thank you for your help, Mister Totti, truly.”

  “Wait!” Totti called, pursuing him through the gauntlet of benches and tool chests. “You seek an Italian for this crime?”

  “There are a great many of your compatriots in the city,” Hawke answered as he reached the door, turning back.

  “The wars of Napoleon ravaged our country,” Totti said as he drew up before the Englishman, his voice desperate, pleading. “The north is a ruin. Como, Lucca, Friuli. We come here for a better life. Do not presume we are killers, I beg you.”

  “That is your concern?” Hawke snapped with sudden anger. “To save your own skin?”

  “And the skins of those I love? Sì, Signore, and I do not regret it.” Totti placed a staying hand on Hawke’s elbow. “A mob stirred by fear is a terrible thing to behold. Once unleashed it cannot be recalled.”

  That made Hawke hesitate, though he could hardly tell the fellow why. He glanced at his elbow and Totti let go. “I harbour no wish for mob justice. But do you think me wrong?”

  Totti offered a pained shrug. “Any man may study the Good Walkers, echo their exploits for an evil deed. Please, sir, do not raise a hue and cry on mere presumption. The people are fretful already, driven so by nothing more than rumour. If those rumours are confirmed, revenge will sweep like wildfire through this community. Clerkenwell will be aflame before sunrise.” He pressed his palms together, eyes glistening. “I beg you, Signore, do not throw us to the dogs.”

  Θ

  Throw us to the dogs.

  Christ, Hawke thought, as he made his way south on Little Northampton Street, but Totti had a knack for tugging heart strings. The fact that he had been so easily manipulated annoyed him, for he was fairly sure that, regardless of the barometer-maker’s doe-eyed pleas, the killer seemed far more likely to hail from the Benandanti heartlands than Smithfield or Moorgate or any other place this side of the Alps. And yet, despite himself, he was reluctant to be the one to whip the mob into frenzy. He had seen what had happened when a spark was touched to the gunpowder of fear, and this powder was already bone dry. The crime broadsides and vulgar pamphlets would be circulating unchecked, spreading from ward to ward like an outbreak of plague, their salacious tales of sorcery and child-murder, probably only half true, serving to sow seeds of fear into fertile minds. London’s Italians were a growing group, and with their businesses and influence gaining traction so soon after a war in which they were Britain’s enemy, it made their entire community vulnerable.

  The sheer pressure of it all felt like a millstone about Hawke’s neck, and he decided to consider his next move over a well-earned drink, while waiting on his scheduled meeting with Ruthven. He hailed a hackney coach at the intersection of King Street and Compton Street, giving some of the Runner’s coins to the driver, and clambered up.

  The driver was an elderly man, with straggly hair the colour of yellowed snow and ill-fitting teeth that had probably once belonged to a horse. He glanced at Hawke dubiously, before making a clicking sound that inspired his pair of palfreys to pull away with a jolt. “Where to, young sir?”

  Hawke called above the clatter of hooves, “The Punchbowl on Red Lion Square, if you please!”

  Θ

  Hawke sat at a low, wildly unbalanced table near the drinking den’s open door. He stared out onto the street, the light already fading to grey, and eyed the neat but barren Red Lion Square beyond, occasionally tilting back his head to quaff gin straight from the bottle, gulping feverishly, desperately, so that the liquid might burn away the cold.

  The Punchbowl nestled between a drapery and a brothel on the north side of the square. A large tobacconist that served as a front for the more clandestine of Bow Street’s operations was situated immediately opposite, on the far side of the central garden, visible through a lattice of branches stripped bare by the bitter season. A carved and painted figure of a native of the Americas stood sentinel outside, his colourful skirts and headdress made from tobacco leaves, large tobacco rolls stuffed under both arms. Behind him, the building’s expansive glass frontage boasted a gaudy array of colourful jars and pots. Hawke observed the busy shop’s comings and goings as he cradled the gin, trying to guess which of the patrons brought genuine custom and which were Runners in disguise.

  It was to the tobacconist that Hawke must ultimately report, as per Ruthven’s instruction, yet now that he was here, he felt a gnawing undercurrent of reticence. Marco Totti’s terrified warning had taken hold, like a leech latching onto his skin, and, despite the calming libation, he was finding it difficult to detach. Hawke had seen the fire of panic and retribution spread once before, and that conflagration had altered the course of his entire life. His actions that day had made him an object of hate for common folk, and his behaviour since had brought shame to his family. If he could avoid becoming the fan to that kind of flame this time, then he would. He needed time to think before planting a seed in Ruthven’s mind. Bow Street needed the case resolved, publicly and decisively, regardless of the wider cost, and his information might very well lead to the vilification of an entire community. Besides, a warming tot or three would not go amiss.

  He swilled the bottle, watching intently as the spirit clung to the inner face of the vessel, snaking its way back down the neck in thick rivulets. Perhaps he could divine the right course therein, like some street-corner fortune teller. He knew that at some point he would have to face Ruthven, regardless of whether he was ready to relay Totti’s information. But what exactly was to be relaid? That Betsy Milne had been murdered by an Italian witch in some kind of pagan ritual? That the murderer was likely to strike again, but not until next Wednesday? He laughed blackly at that last thought. It seemed utterly preposterous. The ravings of a drunk. He regarded the bottle again, his hazy reflection peering back, though he barely recognised the creature he had become. “Fucking wastrel,” he muttered, putting the gin to his lips. His skin was, at least, beginning to feel warmer, glowing from within. He shut his eyes, wallowing in the supreme sensation. The image of Harlowe came to him in the darkness, and that of the Giltspur Boy, Seamus O’Neill. What had he fathomed of that case? Someone was targeting Szekely’s grave-robbing operation. Hardly an impressive display of detection. All in all, he had nothing but scraps to feed the ambitious Bow Street Patrol Officer.

  At a nearby table a man with a palsied arm and a face that was a filigree of claret-coloured veins, sucked hungrily at a wooden pipe. When he coughed, loud and racking, it disturbed Hawke’s stream of thought, and he snapped open his eyes and slumped back in the chair. He reflected upon his meeting in the fantastical Clerkenwell workshop, pictured the Italian who had brought his exquisite technical skill to a new country, and feared losing it all at the hands of panic-stirred rioters. Hawke drank deeply. Absently he watched the tobacconist again, but his mind was no longer in Red Lion Square. It meandered almost two hundred miles northward, to a place called St Peter’s Square, where another crowd gathered in their Sunday best, dignified and quiet, waving banners daubed with slogans imploring peace and progress. Hawke was there too. He saw the faces, the massed bodies of men, women and children surrounding a cart where men would come to speak. Yet he was not amongst them, but set apart. His vantage was high, rocking, obscured by the pricked ears of a huge bay mare. The faces were looking up at him, pale with terror as the bodies linked arms for protection. Hawke heard the slicing song of swords drawn in unison.

  He sat bolt upright, blinking hard, and plunged a hand in his coat pocket. The bottle he pulled out was insignificant enough. Just a few ounces of transparent glass, four inches tall, slightly misshapen, hardly crystal in clarity and stoppered with an imperfectly fitted hunk of cork. Yet Hawke felt like genuflecting b
efore it, as though it were holier than the rarest relic. The man smoking the pipe leered at him through the pungent cloud, sharing an amused wink that might have once appalled Hawke, but, in this moment, he did not care. All that mattered was ridding himself of the memories that buzzed like flies in his skull, for he knew they would not stop. Not until he was screaming and sobbing. It was always thus.

  The label on the bottle had faded, the result of much handling, but the words remained, beckoning like a siren song. The printed block text read “OPIUM TINCTURE”, but it was commonly known by another name. He thumbed free the stopper and lifted the tincture to his lips. There was hardly anything left of the reddish brown liquid, enough for a couple of drops, so he simply upended the bottle and let the last vestiges of the substance gather at the rim, battling gravity until the growing bead was too fat to cling on. It fell suddenly, one then another, dropping directly onto the tip of his tongue, tainting it with its deeply bitter taste, and he clamped shut his mouth as if the elixir might somehow escape. The deed was done and things, for a time at least, would be good. He washed it down with a generous helping of gin.

  Laudanum. Harsh, pungent, beautiful laudanum.

  It was Hawke’s greatest ally and his most implacable foe. He loathed it with every fibre of his being, yet no saintly bones could have elicited greater reverence. When events at St Peter’s Square had overtaken him, when he had found himself in the midst of horror as decent folk had bled and died beneath cold soldierly steel, he had been lost. Unable to face his peers, unwilling to endanger his family, all the while spiralling inexorably into a bottomless abyss. He had gone south, fled to the only city where he could be truly anonymous, but the ghosts had chased him. The horrors had refused to fade. Nothing would ease the pain or the guilt. Nothing except laudanum. He still remembered the first time, when the razor-sharp memories had been blunted in one fell swoop. A miracle, Hawke had thought. A bona fide intervention by God. It was only when the tincture’s effects had worn off that he truly understood, and from that moment on, his very existence had skewed towards recapturing that feeling. A feeling of mindless, remorseless, exquisite oblivion. But the cost had been high. To exchange night terrors with euphoria the drug had enslaved him, as liquor had enslaved him. But the chains of laudanum were far longer, far thicker, far heavier than any to be found in a gin barrel.