by Giles Ekins
She had awoken to find herself lying on a stone bench, in total blackness and at first; she thought she had gone blind. She had screamed out in her terror and fright, but all she heard was the echo of her cries reverberating around the walls of her dank dungeon. Getting to her feet, at first Lucy felt faint and had to lean against the cold slimy walls, breathing deeply whilst she recovered her balance and composure.
Keeping one hand to the wall and the outstretched before her she carefully felt her way around the confines of her cell. On the opposite wall to the stone bench, she felt the outline of a door and hammered her fists against it until her knuckles were sore and bleeding, shouting and yelling before exhausting herself with her efforts, her voice reduced to a croak, her mouth and throat as dry as a Saharan sand storm. Slowly she made her way around the other wall that was lined with empty shelves and back to the bench. By the bench she found a bucket and felt the sudden urge to use it; the stench of her urine filling the close space like a noisome cloth pressed to the face.
Bemoaning her fate, she shivered again, feeling her teeth rattle. She wrapped her arms tightly about herself to try to keep warm as she rocked back and forth, sobbing quietly in despair.
Sometime later a hatch slid open on the door to her cell and a bright burst of light speared across the walls. A face peered in and then an oil lamp was lifted to the hatch to better illuminate the small chill room. Lucy blinked in the harshness of sudden light, holding her hand up to shield her face.
‘Miss Collingwood,’ she heard the voice of her captor, ‘are you awake?’
‘Let me out,’ she cried, ‘let me go. I want my father.’ Feeling her tears running down her face, she repeated, ‘I want my father.’ She wiped her eyes and hurried across to the door, pressing her face to the hatch, feeling the heat from the oil lamp against her cheek. ‘Please,’ she begged, her voice little more than a parched croak, ‘won’t you let me go, I shall say nothing, I just want to be with my father.’
‘As much as I might wish that to be, Miss Lucy, I cannot. It is preordained, predetermined. It must be done this way. The fates decree it.’
Lucy sobbed in anguish and then suddenly felt ashamed of her weakness before her captor. What would Papa think of you, behaving like a hysterical schoolgirl, she berated herself and then mustered all that she could of her courage and dignity.
‘I demand that you let me free this instant.’
‘Bravely spoken, Miss Lucy, but as I say, I regret that it cannot be so.’
‘Won’t you at least then tell me you name, sir? It is nothing less than common courtesy to do so; at least I should know the name of my captor.’
‘You are quite right Miss Collingwood. I stand corrected. My name is Sinistrari. Edward James Sinistrari. At your service, Ma’am,’ and Lucy heard his heels click as he made a small bow to her.
‘Sinistrari?’ Lucy exclaimed, feeling ice-water flooding through her veins, her stomach a hard knot of shock and fear, the very name enough to evoke the most fearful dread. Even though her father had tried to protect her from the more lurid and sensational details of Sinistrari’s murders and trial by hiding the newspapers in his study, Lucy sneaked in there when he was out of the house and had read enough to know that – if indeed it was he – she was captive to one of the most cruel fiends ever known. ‘But you are dead,’ she gasped. ‘Hanged for murder.’
‘Yes’, he drawled, ‘a popular misconception and one that I will shortly set about correcting.’
‘How can that be? It cannot be. You are not he, you are an impostor or a brother but you cannot be Edward Sinistrari. He is dead. My father caught him and he was tried and hanged,’ she cried with fierce loyalty, ‘and that’s an end of it and him. And good riddance!’
Not quite, my dear,’ Sinistrari smiled, enjoying the feisty spirit of his adversary’s daughter. ‘Ask your father.’
‘Let me go and I will.’ Lucy answered sharply.
‘Alas. That cannot be. Satanachia demands it thus.’
‘Satanachia?’
‘The Lord of Darkness, my Master.’
‘The Lord of Darkness!’ Lucy cried, her legs about to give way beneath her, ‘What is to become of me, sir? What does he want of me?’
‘You are an intelligent woman, Lucy; you know enough of your father’s business to know what will be.’
‘To be butchered like those other poor girls, is that what your Master demands?’ she spat back, her voice full of scorn, desperately trying to hide her fear.
‘A tribute, Lucy, nothing less.’
‘May you rot in hell forever, Mister Sinistrari, for my father will surely send you there.’
‘He has tried. And he has failed. And he will fail again.’
‘You underestimate my father, you monster, he will track you down to the ends of the earth and never give up until you are dead.’
‘I do not doubt that he will try, for he is resolute but he is also a fool and will fail again. He will allow his heart to rule his head and that makes him vulnerable. I shall crush him as I should have crushed him before. Now, I cannot spare any more time in idle discourse. I have brought you some water and a blanket if you wish it, the chill in there is more than considerable.’
Lucy wanted to tell Sinistrari to go to hell and take his water and blanket with him but common sense prevailed, her throat was raw from thirst and the cold still ate into her bones with insidious ease.
‘Thank you, sir, you are most kind,’ she said sarcastically, dropping an ironic curtsey which Sinistrari could not see from behind the door. ‘And if you please Mister Sinistrari, could you also leave the lamp? I am very much afraid of the dark and there are rats and other kinds of vermin in here.’
Sinistrari pondered her request for a moment or two, trying to ascertain if there was anything other than a desire for light behind her request and then agreed, as much out of admiration for her spirit than for any altruistic reasons.
‘Very well, Miss Lucy, stand back from the door and down sit on the bench.
She did as she was told and then the door creaked open, no more than eighteen inches. A blanket was tossed through the gap, then a bottle of water was pushed through with a clink of glass and then finally the oil lamp was placed on the stone-flagged floor of the cell; the door slammed quickly to, followed by the rasp of a turning lock. The hatch slid closed.
Gratefully Lucy wrapped the rough woollen blanket about her and then warmed her hands around the glass of the lamp. She took a sip or two of water, the chill liquid easing her throat as she fought with an urge to drink down the whole bottle in one go; not knowing how long it might be before she got some more.
‘ABSOLUTELY NOT, SIR.’ INSISTED GOODLEY as Collingwood and Flanagan tried to speak with Sir Montague Portman again in one last desperate attempt to get him to reveal what he might know of Sinistrari and his affairs. ‘Sir Montague has left the most explicit instructions and under no circumstances will I disobey. It will do you no good to try to force your way into the office as you did previously since he now keeps it locked behind him to prevent just such an occurrence. I suggest Chief Inspector that you leave.
‘My daughter is missing. I must see Sir Montague. I insist that you advise him at once.’
‘No sir, I will do no such thing.’
‘Do you not understand?’ interjected Flanagan, ‘Mister Collingwood’s daughter has been abducted and Sir Montague may well have information that might help.’
‘I am most sorry to hear that, sir, but my answer must remain the same and any threats of police action you may care to take against me are valueless, Mister Collingwood. Sir Montague Portman has made that quite plain, I must bid you good day, gentlemen. Please do not make a further scene, it is somewhat unbecoming.’
Knowing they were defeated Collingwood and Flanagan turned away. Collingwood was sick with worry, only two days remained before Halloween and the certain death of Lucy. He had no other lines to follow. He had paced the streets in vain, questioned all the househ
olders and staff of most of the houses in Fletcher Crescent to ascertain whether they had seen anything of Lucy’s abduction but none could recall seeing anything untoward or noticed the coach parked outside Collingwood’s house.
Obsessively he paced his office, reading Flanagan’s crime boards over and over again, anxiety and fear and guilt gnawing at him like acid. Flanagan was no better, going through his notes, flicking through the pages of his notebook, desperate to find any clue, however remote, that he might have missed but it was a forlorn hope.
Chapter 31
LUCY COLLINGWOOD DIPPED THE LENGTH OF TORN PETTICOAT into the oil well of the lamp, pushing four or five inches of material into the lamp to soak up some of the lamp oil. Then she pushed down the lever to raise the glass and slid the oil -soaked cloth into the flame. Lucy carefully withdrew the lighted strip of cloth and with her heart hammering blew out the lamp. The thin light from the petticoat flickered alarmingly around the walls and Lucy was afraid it was about to extinguish and cupped her hands about the flame, even though there was no discernible draught in the cell. Satisfied that the flame was established she laid the make-shift torch onto the bench, stretching out the material to ensure the flame lasted as long as possible. Working quickly she bound the rest of her petticoat around her hands and seized hold of the thin handle close to where it was fastened to the main body of the lamp, feeling the heat from the lamp case even through the cloth. Using all her strength, she twisted and pulled at the thin metal of the handle, no more than an eighth of an inch in thickness, working it around the boss to which the end of the handle was affixed. Warily she watched the flame on her temporary wick; she would have to relight the lamp again if the oil-soaked material burned down much more. Then with a sudden lurch which almost made her drop the lamp the handle tore free.
Encouraged Lucy began to twist away the other end and it quickly came free in turn. The petticoat wick was almost burnt through and Lucy quickly relit the lamp, burning her fingers on the still hot glass as she did so. With a grimace of pain she sucked at her burnt fingers before picking up the detached U shaped handle. Each end of the handle had been bent into a circle that had gone around the protruding boss at the top of the lamp case. She tried to unbend one of the tight ends, but the metal eye was too small for her fingers to get sufficient grip Frustrated she almost threw the handle aside, banging it in irritation onto the stone bench, the tinny sound grating on her taut-stretched nerves.
Then she took hold of the handle in both hands about the middle of the U, bending it back and forth in an attempt to break the metal wire. Back and forth, she rapidly twisted and bent the iron, feeling the friction heat building up as she worked at the metal. Then it suddenly snapped in two and one sharp end drove into the web of flesh between her first finger and thumb. With a shock of pain, she dropped the two halves of the handle and sucked at the wound before wrapping another length from her torn petticoat to try to staunch the bleeding.
Panting heavily from her efforts, Lucy bent to find the handle sections on the floor and another wave of dizziness and nausea swept over her. She sat back, cold sweat beading her brow.
She took another small sip of water and dabbed at her face with yet another piece of petticoat dampened with the precious water. Her stomach grumbled with hunger and she realised she had not eaten for very many hours, which was probably why she felt so faint.
Don’t give up now, she scolded herself. Keeping her head up Lucy squatted to her haunches and felt around on the stone-flagged floor until she found the pieces of handle. Gripping one piece tightly in the dampened cloth she pushed the broken end of the other piece into the fastening eye of the section she held. About a quarter of an inch protruded through the eye as Lucy tried to bend the length of protruding wire against the rim of the eye, but the metal pieces kept slipping in her hand.
Cursing, using words that her father would have been most shocked to hear, she separated the pieces to try again, wondering how she could get more purchase on the eyelet piece, which kept turning, in her hands.
Then she pressed the piece with the eyelet flat on top of the bench, with the eyelet just sticking out beyond the edge of the bench. She inserted the other piece the quarter inch she required and pulled them tight against the hard edge of the bench, creating a crude vice.
Slowly she bent the metal section over so that the quarter inch section in the eyelet was bent at 90 degrees. She really wanted to bend it further still, to create a hook, put she was afraid to stress the metal too far, she did not want it snapping off when she came to use it. Then she twisted the other end into a bend to use as a handle.
Panting from her efforts Lucy took another sip of her precious water and rested for five minutes or so as she tried to recall an incident from her youth.
She had been about eleven or twelve when her father had needed to change the locks. One of the staff, Purboy, the foot-boy, had stolen a set of house keys from a hook on the key-board in the butler’s pantry as well as a quantity of silver cutlery and then fled. Purboy had been quickly apprehended and the silver recovered before he could sell it but the keys were never found and Purboy refused to say what he had done with them or who he had given them to. He was sent to a Reformatory for two years.
As soon as the disappearance of the keys was noticed Collingwood immediately changed the locks and Lucy could still remember the locksmith who had come to do the job; a wizened old ex -con called Magister Wakeham, who claimed he could pick a lock with a ‘piece of string’. Magister had once been one of the most nimble cracksmen in the business, who with his set of custom made ‘bettys1’ could pick any lock in the city. But he was caught once too often, this time breaking into a house in Connaught Square and served seven years in Marshallsea Goal, his third spell in prison.
On his release, Magister had decided to go straight and had set himself up as a legitimate locksmith. He had even designed a lock that he claimed even he could not pick, but none of the lock manufacturers, Chubb or Union or Squires had been interested in his invention and the discarded lock lay in a drawer in his workshop, never to see the light of day again.
Collingwood, like many policeman, held a grudging respect for the ‘professional crook’; one who used especial skills or talent in the pursuit of crime rather than the use of violence or intimidation and Collingwood, who had arrested Magister Wakeham on the last occasion, did respect his locksmith’s skill and employed him whenever the need arose.
Lucy had watched him go about his work and then Collingwood had challenged the old burglar to demonstrate his skills. Magister had showed her the bettys and how to use them. Then he asked Lucy for a hat pin. Using his pliers, Magister had bent one end of the pin into a small hook and then bent the other end into a large circle to use as a grip. Gently he inserted the hook end into the front door lock, the heaviest most complex deadbolt lock in the house. Holding the pick in both hands, one to guide and one to turn Magister held his ears close to the lock as he gently manipulated the pick back and forth, feeling for the pins.
‘Always gentle, Miss Lucy,’ he had said, ‘feel for ’em, talk to ’em, listen to the pins.’ Then with a flick of his wrist, the lock was opened. Then he had let Lucy try, but no matter how she tried she could not find the pins. Frustrated she had thrown the pick aside. ‘This is stupid,’ she said petulantly.
‘No Miss, don’t take on so, nobody gets it first time o’ trying. Took my old Dad plenty of time and a thrashing or two before ’e could teach me the business. Just try again, but remember, keep it gentle like, tickle ’em. Tickle ’em sweetly,’
Lucy tried again and this time was successful. ‘Look Papa, I picked the lock with this bent pin.’
‘I’m not quite sure I approve of you instructing my daughter in criminal ways. Magister Wakeham,’ Collingwood said with mock seriousness.
‘Never know when it might come in handy, sir.’
Then Magister asked Collingwood to handcuff him, handcuff him with his hands behind his back. Within thirt
y seconds, he was free, apparently without using any tools or picklock whatsoever.
‘Heavens, Wakeham,’ Collingwood exclaimed, ‘how on earth did you manage that?’
Magister winked at Lucy and tapped the side of his nose with his fore-finger. ‘Some secrets are best kept that way, aren’t they, Miss?’
Now Lucy needed all of Magister’s skills – ‘never know when it might come in handy – he had said and never was a truer word spoken.
Once again, Lucy dipped a length of her torn petticoat into the oil of the lamp and then worked the rag into the keyhole of the lock, twisting the oily cloth around inside the lock to lubricate the workings as much as possible.
‘Magister Wakeham, help me now,’ she whispered and inserted her pick into the lock, holding it as the old con he taught her, her left hand to guide, the other to work the pick. Kneeling by the door, she gently slid the betty forward a fraction then turned it gently anti-clockwise, listening for the click of the pins, feeling for the give.
Inserting it another fraction of an inch. ‘Tickle them sweetly,’ she whispered again. Another fraction. Another anti-clockwise turn of the pick, a slight give, the pins clicking against the end of the pick. Gently. Gently. Turned the pick a fraction more, testing the give. Nothing, no movement. Back a fraction, her hands sweating, her back aching with the strain of kneeling by the door with her ear to the lock.
Again. Insert the pick another sliver or two, carefully turning the betty, her other hand making sure the pick was straight within the lock. A morsel of give. She turned it again, the base of her thumb cramping with the strain, she felt the pins give. Gently, gently, tickle the pins sweetly – more give, the lock was turning – carefully – carefully, not to put too much stress on the metal of the pick, holding her breath, not daring to breath, desperately hoping that the betty would not break under the pressure. Definite turn! More turn – the lock was turning! Gently – don’t rush it now. Don’t snap the betty!
