The circus master grinned again. “Ah, yes. Have you seen her? She is a wonder.” He looked Thaddeus up and down, slyly. “She is pretty, too, no? Ah, but alas – she is not for sale.”
Thaddeus blinked, and then frowned. This man made his skin crawl. “Where is she?”
The man sighed heavily, and then pulled out a pocketwatch. He made a show of flipping it open and checking the time before looking surprised.
“She has only been off the trapeze for… what? Cinq minutes? She is probably getting changed.”
“You haven’t seen her, then?”
The man shook his head. His lank hair remained still, slicked against his scalp. “Non.”
“Do you know where she might be?”
The circus owner showed his teeth again. “Ah, well, she is slippery, that one. A good girl, really – but slippery. Wild.” He shook with faint laughter. “It is why she is ‘Little Bird’, yes? Because she is little, and… she flutters, here and there.”
“What’s her real name?”
The man frowned, as if Thaddeus had asked him a riddle. “Her real name?… She is Little Bird.”
“No,” Thaddeus said, impatiently. “Not her stage name. Her real name. What do you call her, when she is not performing?”
“Ah, I think I see what you mean.” Gustave paused, a pained expression on his face as if he were trying hard to remember something long forgotten. “Moineau,” the man said eventually.
“And her surname?” Thaddeus barked, becoming increasingly frustrated.
“Her surname… let me see…” Gustave hesitated again, letting out a long sigh. “Volant. Yes, Moineau Volant.”
Thaddeus nodded, taking out his notepad and writing down the name. He asked Gustave to spell it for him, careful to make sure he got it right. Moineau Volant. Not Rémy Brunel.
“And the other circus performers would confirm that, would they?” he asked, looking up into the man’s chubby, pale face. “If I asked them for her real name?”
“We all call her Little Bird, monsieur. I know not whether she has told others her… ‘real name’ as you call it. If she has, then that will be the name they give you.”
The policeman put away his notepad and pencil. “Yes,” he said, thoughtfully. “Yes, I’m sure it will be.”
* * *
The streets were slick with rain and Rémy did not like to think what else. Her silver slippers were soon soaked through and blackened by the grime that oozed over every cobble and encrusted the rough paving of the alleyways. She had to get rid of her circus costume. In these dark streets, it was beginning to attract attention. She might as well have shouted “I am a stranger and alone, come and get me.” She dodged into a dark hollow of mouldering brick, crouching to open the bag that Claudette had given her. She found her favourite black shirt and belt, a pair of leggings and her trusty boots. There was also a thick cloak that Rémy recognised as belonging to her friend. Oh, how she loved her dear Claudette.
Pulling on the shirt, Rémy wriggled awkwardly out of the leotard. She hesitated for a moment, taking one last look at her dazzling costume, before using the fabric to scrub her face clean of the lingering greasepaint. As she stared at the smudge of mingled colours on the yellow satin, she wondered whether she would ever again perform as Little Bird. How would she survive without the circus? Of course, she had dreamed for so long of escaping it, of leaving that life behind. Yet, in those dreams, she had always had Claudette and Amélie by her side. Now she was cast adrift on an unknown ocean, without her friends, and she didn’t know when, or even if, she would see them again.
Shaking herself, Rémy pulled on her leggings and then her cloak. She looked up at the ribbon of night sky, only just visible between the roofs over her head. It was late, and she was suddenly deathly tired. Around her, sounds were muted – there was only the odd burst of music rising through the open door of an all-night public house, and occasionally the hollow laughter of a drunken woman. She looked around the little alcove she had found and realized it was probably as safe a place as she would find to sleep tonight.
Wrapping her cloak more firmly around herself, Rémy sank to the ground and curled up with her head resting on her knees, the drawstring handle of her bag looped around one wrist. The wall was damp and uncomfortable against her back, and the cold bit at her despite Claudette’s cloak. But eventually she slept, her dreams unhappy.
She was roused some time later by a slight tickle. It felt as if someone were brushing a feather against her arm. Her immediate thought was rats, and she shifted slightly, unafraid and too deeply asleep to stir properly. The feeling went away for a few minutes, and then came back with a vengeance. It wasn’t a tickle, it was something tugging, something…
Rémy snapped awake properly as the drawstring of her bag gave beneath the knife sawing at it. She was on her feet in a second, but it was too late. The thief – a small, scrawny boy – had fled, his prize held tight in his arms.
“Hey!” she shouted at the cutpurse as he vanished down the alley. “Stop! You little –”
Rémy gave chase, dashing out into the grey, weak light of morning. It had begun to rain again. Icy drips of water slid down Rémy’s neck and she pulled the hood of her cloak up around her ears.
Rounding the corner after the boy, she found herself in a busier street. There were knots of people everywhere, huddled, crouching in corners or muttering together beside the crumbling brick walls. Pungent smoke – from the houses of those lucky enough to have a few lumps of coal, as well as from decrepit old pipes – hung in wraiths around their heads. The poisonous air was full of the sound of coughs and wails, shouts and the occasional scream, always cut short. Children skittered past her legs, as fast as rats and just as scrawny. The place reeked of hunger and decay, and there was desperation everywhere. Rémy knew poverty from France. It was a fearful disease and there was no cure, not in streets as poor as these.
She dodged and wove through the throngs of people, her boots echoing along the narrow alley walls. No one took any notice of her cries, or even turned to look at the fleeing boy, clutching her bag as his bony legs carried him along. He kept looking over his shoulder to see if Rémy had given up yet, but she was determined and, despite Gustave’s tight-fistedness, still better fed than an East End street urchin. Besides, the bag and its contents were now all she had in the world. She wasn’t going to let them go without a fight.
The thief ducked into an even narrower alley, and then immediately darted right, into another so narrow that two men would struggle to walk abreast. Rémy was quick, though, and followed easily. She could see that the boy was tiring, the distance between them lessening with every step.
“I’m not going to give up,” she shouted after him. “So you might as well drop the bag!”
The boy didn’t answer. He disappeared from sight, instead. Rémy skidded to a stop where she’d last seen him, looking around, perplexed. Then, over the noise of rain and despair, she heard a faint metal clang. Looking up, she saw him shimmying up an old, rusting pipe, heading for the rooftops.
Rémy didn’t hesitate. The pipe was fragile but she was quick and nimble, and the walls were so close together that she knew she could easily brace herself if necessary. She was quieter than the boy, too, so when she appeared on the roof beside him, he started.
“Not so fast,” she snapped, as the wheezing child tried to scramble away. She pinned him by the shoulder, holding him still with one hand and ripping her bag from his grip with the other.
“Bleedin’ ‘eck’!” The boy whimpered, looking back towards the roof’s edge. “Where in ‘ell d’you learn to climb like that?”
Rémy put the bag behind her out of his reach, but didn’t let him go. “A good lesson to learn, rat. ‘Never judge a book by its cover’, I believe you say here. Strangers might be out of place, but that does not make them h
elpless.”
They were both breathing hard and the boy didn’t attempt to struggle from Rémy’s grip. He seemed to have accepted that he’d been beaten, and his eyes closed as he caught his breath. Rémy thought he was probably about ten years old, but he was so thin and malnourished he looked younger. His face, lined with dirt, looked gaunt, his eyes dark hollows.
“Sorry,” he said eventually. “Just ‘ungry, y’see. ‘Aven’t ‘ad a bite today. Not likely to, neither. Didn’t ‘ave one yesterday, come to think of it. And you looked like you could spare a bit.”
“Well, you are wrong,” Rémy told him, and then relented. After all, she knew no one here, or even where she was. Perhaps this was an opportunity to make a friend – or at least buy one for a while. She let him go and opened the bag, searching for the small purse that contained the money Claudette had given her.
“I have not eaten either,” she told the boy. “I bet you know somewhere we can get a meal for little money, yes?”
The boy blinked at her. “Eh?”
“I won’t ask twice. I do not make a habit of buying meals for my enemies, so you’d better make yourself my friend before I change my mind.”
He scrambled up with a quick grin. “We can go to The Grapes. It ain’t far.”
As Rémy stood up, she asked, “What is your name?”
“J,” he said. “Friends call me J.”
She nodded. “D’accord, J. Lead the way.”
* * *
“Where’d you learn to speak English so proper, anyway?” J asked, an hour or so later, his mouth stuffed full of greasy bacon. They were sitting in the narrow, wood-panelled dining room of The Grapes. It was so close to the Thames that Rémy could smell the sewage stench of the river even though they had opted to sit inside, rather than on the shabby balcony that hung over the water.
She rested her chin on one hand and shrugged. “Claudette – a friend – taught me.”
“Oh yeah? Frenchie too, is she?”
“Yes.”
“So where’d she learn it, then?”
Rémy frowned. It was a question that had never occurred to her before. Claudette always seemed to know something about everything. It was just the way she was. “I don’t know.”
J nodded, then carried on shoving food into his mouth, losing interest in his question in favour of the first proper meal he’d had in weeks.
“Where are your parents?” Rémy asked.
J shrugged. “Dunno. Never really ‘ad any. There was me mum, once, but… she went.”
“Where do you live, then?”
“Here an’ there. Why?” he asked, suspiciously. “There ain’t no more room for no one else, if that’s what you’re thinkin’.”
Rémy shook her head. “I’m just passing through. Looking for someone.”
“Oh? Oo’s that, then?”
“His name is Abernathy.”
J’s fork froze on its way to his mouth. He even stopped chewing for a moment. He didn’t lift his chin, but looked up at her from beneath his brow. “What d’you want to find ‘im for?”
Rémy shifted in her seat. “You know him? Is he really a lord?”
The boy snorted. “Yeah. Yeah, ‘e’s a lord, alright. Listen to the Sally Ann and you’d think ‘e was a bleedin’ saint.”
Rémy frowned. “Sally Ann?”
J shook his head. “Don’t you have ‘em in France? The Salvation Army. They’re the only ones’ll feed you down ‘ere if you ain’t got nuffin. Give you a bed for the night too, if you read a bit of the good book wiv ‘em. Won’t give you booze, though. Don’t hold with it.” J sniggered through his food then looked back at Rémy, his expression suddenly serious. “You want to keep away from ‘im, though. Abernathy, I mean. I reckon ‘e’s dodgy as a fish stall after four o’ the clock.”
She leaned forward. “Why? Why do you think that?”
J resumed shovelling food into his mouth, taking a breath to lift his now-empty pint glass. “Could murder another pint o’ porter, I could.”
Rémy shook her head. “Tell me about Lord Abernathy, then we’ll see.”
“What do you want to know about ‘im for, anyway?” J asked, evasively.
“He stole something. Something valuable. Something I want. Something the police think I already have.”
J snorted. “The coppers? They’re about as useful as a cold cup o’ tea. They won’t follow you down ‘ere, and they won’t do nuffin about Abernathy, that’s for sure.”
“How do you know?”
“‘E’s got friends in ‘igh places. He’s a lord, ain’t he? Stands to reason. And…” J trailed off, staring at his plate.
“And what? Come on, J. Tell me.”
J shrugged. “People ‘ave been going missing for months down ‘ere,” he said. “No one cares, cos it’s just us, ain’t it? But me mate, he went one night, and I got to thinking. Got to looking around a bit more, like. And I reckon… Well, I reckon it’s ‘im.”
“Abernathy? You think he’s kidnapping people?”
“Ssh,” J hissed, looking around to see if anyone had overheard. “For gawd’s sake, keep your voice down!”
“All right, all right,” said Rémy, lowering her voice.
The boy fiddled with his glass for another moment, before he said, “I dunno. It’s just a hunch. The Sally Ann reckon ‘e’s all about building new ‘omes for us poor folk. They say that’s why e’s bought up all the old mines. Improvin’ our lives, they say. ‘E’s definitely got something going on down there in those tunnels. But I don’t think he’s buildin’ bits o’ ‘omes. I reckon it’s something else.”
“What?”
J shrugged. “How should I know?”
“Have you told anyone?” Rémy asked.
J snorted again, but this time it was a sadder sound. “Oo’s goin’ to listen to me?”
Rémy shrugged. “I am.”
The boy eyed her. “Yeah, but you’re like me, really, ain’t you? I mean, besides being a foreigner ‘an all that.”
“Where are these mines?’ Rémy asked after a moment. “Can you take me there?”
J looked at her with the steady stare of someone speaking to an addled mind. “As if. You’d not catch me getting close to ‘em. I’m not being caught. No, sir. Life’s bad enough already.” He banged his empty glass on the table. “I can take you to ‘is house, though. So, what about that porter, eh? Fair’s fair, ain’t it?”
Six
Suspicions and Accusations
Having interviewed as many of the circus folk as he could find and searched around for clues, it was the early hours of the morning by the time Thaddeus returned to Scotland Yard. The old building glimmered in the fresh rain and he was surprised to see that there were still lights on in the wing occupied by the detective division. His colleagues were not known for working late.
He felt eyes following him as he pushed through the wooden double doors and headed for his desk. There was a sudden hush, as if all conversations in the room had become unnecessary. Collins appeared from nowhere, looking surly.
“About time you showed up, boy. This place is in uproar because of you.” Collins nodded over his shoulder to the shut door of Chief Inspector Glove’s office. “He’s out for blood.”
Thaddeus nodded wearily as he dropped into his chair. He’d known as much, even without being told. “What is being done?” he asked Collins. “Have they questioned the guards? Do they have any more information about the girl?”
The other policeman crossed his arms. He opened his mouth to speak, too, but before Collins had a chance, the Chief Inspector’s door opened and Glove appeared. His gaze fell upon Thaddeus immediately and darkened. Thaddeus quickly stood up again.
“Rec.”
Thaddeus inclined his hea
d. “Chief Inspector.”
Glove looked slowly around the room. The other detectives fell even quieter. The hush filled the room like a bubble ready to burst.
“So,” Glove said, a question in his voice. “Did you find the suspect – this girl you went to apprehend at… the circus?”
“She –” Thaddeus shook his head. “She wasn’t there, sir.”
The Chief Inspector looked at him steadily. “She wasn’t there.”
“No, sir. Or at least – she was there.” He looked at Collins for support. “Collins saw her, same as me. When we first arrived, she was in the middle of her act, sir. But after that… she vanished.”
Glove turned his gaze on Collins. “And do you confirm that the girl you saw on the trapeze was the same girl at Lord Abernathy’s side earlier this evening, Collins?”
There was a pause. Collins cheeks reddened. Thaddeus felt the knot in his stomach tighten. “I… No, sir,” said Collins. “No. I can’t.”
“Collins!” Thaddeus said, “but you saw –”
The other man shook his head, impatient. “What I saw, lad, was a circus girl on a wire. Her face was so covered in paint, even her mother would find it hard to recognise her! Secondly, how you think she stole the jewel and got back in time to be up there, doing her act, is beyond me. And thirdly –” Collins shrugged, looking at the Chief Inspector. “Does there need to be a thirdly, Chief?”
Glove raised one eyebrow. “Probably not. So how do you explain all this, young Rec?”
“But… but she disappeared straight after her act,” Thaddeus stuttered. “No one would tell me where she was. And I swear, it was her, I know it.”
“It’s very convenient, isn’t it?” said Glove. “You alone are convinced that the girl at the Tower is the same girl you saw at the circus. And now that girl has also vanished. And didn’t I hear that you were hanging around the circus last night – looking for a buyer perhaps?”
Thaddeus shook his head, confused. What was happening here? “A buyer? Sir, I don’t –”
The Diamond Thief Page 5
