Johannes was sure the wound was beginning to open again. Something curled and uncurled below his ribs. Again that whistle. It seemed to haunt him, guide him—but no one approached. He sensed eyes in the darkness. The hairs on the back of his neck prickled and stung, and he realized with a detached surprise that he was afraid. He had seen fear on the faces of others, but had had no experience of it himself till now. He remembered seeing fear on Manzerotti’s face—but only once, when they were children and one of the young students in the musical academy who had not had the operation had struck Manzerotti down and called him a freak, an affront to God. Johannes had knocked the offender on his back and offered the little boy in front of him his hand. At that time Johannes had been the jewel in the school’s crown; his voice was of a clarity declared miraculous, his artistry exceptional. Since coming from Germany he had been treated like a little God. Now a boy brushed past him in the dark street, a fleeing shadow. He put his hand to his pocket and cursed. His money taken. He hissed into the thick gloom where the boy had disappeared. There was a laugh. A soft female voice called from some dark corner: “All fleeced, uncle?” He took a couple of painful steps toward it, but heard the light step of feet running from him. The laugh again. More distant. The whistle, closer and from the other side of the road.
Johannes had begged for the operation; gone down on his knees to his father, a wood turner in Leipzig, with the priest standing behind him. The priest had told them he was a gift from God, that his voice could serve the Church in all its beauty forever. The boy had begged to give himself to his Savior’s glory. Reluctantly his father had agreed, and Johannes had thanked the Lord, though through his ecstasy he could still hear the softened clink of money being placed in his father’s hand. He had left his home that day; traveled with the priest to the local court where a doctor from Italy happened to be staying and seeing to several boys. He heard the soft exchange of currency again and traveled to Bologna at the doctor’s side, overjoyed that God was bringing him to His bosom. Manzerotti, by contrast, had not wished it. Had tried to run. Had failed. Had arrived at the school for a life of daily vocal and musical practice as a possible, a potential—his voice still all thin and empty. Then Johannes had helped him to his feet and looked into those black eyes for the first time.
“You speak strangely,” Manzerotti had said as he stood upright again.
“I was born in Germany,” Johannes replied in his clear bell-like voice. “I have studied here two years. Every language I speak now, I speak with a foreigner’s tongue.”
Molloy twisted the top of the table and moved away. The King’s Messenger with him stepped forward and pulled out a neat roll of papers.
“There we have it then,” he said. Molloy nodded and began to feel about in the hidden drawers a little more, but the messenger put a hand to his sleeve. “Why don’t we have the witch woman with us, or that boy?”
Molloy pulled his hat down over his ears and wrapped his cloak around him.
“Mrs. Bligh has other business.” He found and picked up the brooch of flowers. The messenger watched him with narrowed eyes, but Molloy put the brooch in his pocket anyhow. The man would make nothing of it, and he had been asked to fetch it. He heard a whistle on the street outside and was satisfied.
Johannes thought of the river. If he could get to the far shore, then to the anonymity of Southwark, he could send to Manzerotti for help from there. He limped toward the crowd of men at the Black Lyon Stairs. The whistle came from behind him. The watermen turned and looked at him a moment, then without speech to him or to one another, each retired to his boat and cast off. Johannes lifted his pocket watch so it caught the light of the oil lamp guttering greasily by the steps to show he had money, but the skiffs and wherries drew away. Johannes swallowed and put the watch back in his pocket. Fear flowered into a sweat on his brow. He turned up the hill again, making for the rookeries of Chandos Street, where he had tracked one of the witch’s spies. There a man could hide. The significance of the watermen pulling away from him so silent and of one mind, he would not think of.
Mr. Palmer stood in the center of Carmichael’s study, a still moment in the activity of the room, and looked through the papers that had been found behind the Latin texts and in the false front of the fireplace. There was a considerable amount of money in banknotes and gold, and a letter in French confirming “the recommendation of the man that carries it, who can be recognized in the usual way.” Fitzraven, Palmer supposed. There were four charts showing details of Portsmouth and Spithead and the arrangement of vessels within them, and a model of a gun he had himself given into the hands of his secretary to be placed in one of the vaults. There was also a dense page of notes full of fresh gossip from the Admiralty and the competing political factions within it. He paused in his reading to push the little model to and fro across Lord Carmichael’s desk.
“Field?” he said.
One of the men shaking out the neat volumes in the rear bookcase paused in his work and turned around.
“Yes, sir?”
“Go and tell Lord Sandwich we are ready for him.”
Johannes did not know at what moment he realized his voice was leaving him. During a practice, a strange hum had begun at the back of his throat. When he spoke, the edges of his words started sounding a little shrill. He thought he was merely tired, as he had sung for the school several times in the evenings, and still had to be awake at dawn for the morning service. It was about a week after he had helped Manzerotti to his feet. He saved the little Italian boy and suddenly the boy’s voice was beginning to flower and grow. A few days later, Johannes had opened his lips to sail across the surface of Scarlatti’s Stabat Mater like a swan on water, and as the first phrase lifted into the second, the ice of his voice had cracked and a strange yelping croak leaped from his mouth like a toad. He had stopped. Horrified. The boys next to him began to look afraid. He gazed across to the singers on the opposite side of the choir, terrified, and had met Manzerotti’s black eyes. They were calm, loving; he gave Johannes the faintest ghost of a smile, then turned his attention back toward the priest.
Johannes bowed his head and submitted; his great grief seemed to rise from the center of the earth, poured up his body through his throat and out into the world. It was a wave of silence, taking whatever was left of his voice with it. He never opened his lips to sing again.
Mrs. Service rapped lightly at the door and went in.
“Mrs. Bligh, a young man called Ripley just called. He said you and Crowther should attend at the place thought of. Do I have the message right?”
Jocasta swept up her cards and pocketed them. Crowther shrugged on his frock coat and smoothed the sleeves.
“Aye, Mrs. Service. You have it right.”
When the audience heard the introduction to the “Yellow Rose Duet” they called and wept afresh. The leader of the band stood and put his violin to his chin, and as Manzerotti gracefully stepped aside and offered him up to the audience, he began to play Isabella’s part. From the back of the stalls Mr. Harwood observed his theater. It was a world of light; the oil lamps blazed above him and cast down across the gilt moldings on the boxes, across the jewels and dresses of the women and threw their shimmerings to and fro like fireworks, blessed by the colors around them.
It was a woman in one of the boxes closest to the stage who began it. With trembling fingers she undid the yellow rose from her bodice and threw it down onto the stage at Manzerotti’s feet. Then, from the box opposite, another woman in red silk did the same. Soon the theater was alive with the rustle of foliage and paper, and the roses began to flow forward. Those who could not reach the stage dropped their flowers into the stalls, and they were passed forward and overhead till those nearest the footlights could gather them in armfuls and, passing them over the heads of the musicians in the pit, lay them with the other tribute.
Manzerotti began to sing his line, stepping forward so the petals made a carpet for the jeweled heels of his shoes to rest on. T
hat clarion call of his voice . . . it seemed to Harwood that the song of duty and loyalty was not simply the voice of a single man, but the spirit of all he loved about the opera sculpted into sound. He knew he was an illusionist and a businessman, knew better than any the petty betrayals and rivalries, the viciousness of ambition and ambition thwarted that lay behind the music and the golden stage; knew too his house was full because his audience came to see where blood had been shed, and try and imagine they could see the stains, but for a moment he let his spirit rest on the glories of Manzerotti’s voice and forgot that anything else had ever existed in time but music and light.
Lord Sandwich watched Carmichael across the auditorium. He was observing the stage with such profound satisfaction one could believe Manzerotti was his man, not his master. Lord Sandwich was not a man easily shocked, but the story Mr. Palmer had laid out for him that morning in his office at the Admiralty had shaken him. Worst was the note he had received telling him that Carmichael’s stepson Longley had been killed attempting to flee the King’s Messenger sent to stop him at Harwich. He had panicked and been trampled to death by a startled horse on the main thoroughfare of that town. They had hoped to turn him. Give him a chance to redeem himself in their service, but on being approached, the child had only thought of the executioner’s noose and knife, and was dead before Palmer’s letter could be put into his hand.
And there sat Carmichael in his box as assured and comfortable as a cat on silk. Sandwich crushed in his hand the note received from Mr. Palmer’s man. It was a singular pleasure to be about this business himself. The First Lord then bent over the delicate white palm of the lady with whom he was seated and with a smile left her to flirt with her fan alone for a little while. He closed the door to the box behind him and began to walk the corridor around to the other side of the auditorium, nodding to a man waiting there as he went.
Johannes was becoming dizzy from the pain in his leg. A black-skinned boy appeared from the shadows behind him. Johannes looked about him. The braziers were lit, but the filth-floored roadway was deserted. There had been people here before.
The boy, when he spoke, did so with the soft-water French accent of a Creole. “All alone, Tonton? Do you need a place? I’ll show you somewhere warm.” Johannes gritted his teeth and nodded. The boy took him by the hand and began to lead him forward through the leaping shadows, the flames thrown up on either side. The whistle again. Another laugh.
The door to Carmichael’s box opened, and he twisted around in his chair. Seeing the First Lord of the Admiralty enter he started to stand, but Sandwich placed one hand on his shoulder.
“No, no, Carmichael. Do not get up.” He took a seat next to him and whispered to Carmichael’s heavily rouged companion, “My dear, I have confidential business with this man. Would you be so kind?” She gave him a bold look, then smiled and cocked her head so the jewels about her handsome throat glimmered. She made her way out into the corridor. Sandwich watched her go with an appreciative eye.
“Carmichael, I congratulate you. I had no idea you could afford a whore that fine.” Then Sandwich leaned into him, murmuring, “Tell me, does she fuck your friends for tidbits useful to the French, or is she pure recreation?”
Carmichael’s arm spasmed and he tried to stand, but Sandwich had him firmly pressed to his chair. He continued in his pleasant whisper.
“No, no, my dear. Do not attempt to leave. Do you not wish to answer? No matter, we shall ask her ourselves.” Again Carmichael made an effort to stand; again he was forced down. “Really, Carmichael, be still. There is a gentleman outside the door to whom I have paid a large sum of money for his assurance that he will shoot you if you try to leave. And I think Harwood has had enough blood spilled in his theater in the past few days. Shortly we shall return to your house to discuss matters more fully, but for now, stay still. Enjoy the end of the aria. It will be the last music you ever hear, you know. He sings prettily, does he not?”
“Yes.”
“How it must have burned, to have him sent here to take control of your activities. A half-man like that, a performer. Yet he would never have tried to use your stepson to carry messages. I am sure that was your plan, and not approved. Longley was too young, too honorable; even given his debt to you and fear of you, he was bound to be too open in his ways. Manzerotti did far better with the woman who sells coffee and oranges here, and that runt Fitzraven. Did you even notice that Longley told Mrs. Westerman he was going to Harwich? You were too busy flaunting your power. Your wish to see others dance to your tune has made you a bad spy, Carmichael, and the boy is dead with some of your papers still on him. All that chatter about corruption in the Admiralty, and who in London supports the rebel cause. You did well there, I admit.”
He watched Lord Carmichael’s face for any reaction. The man did not move, but he looked as if some light had disappeared from under his skin.
“What will happen to my collection, Sandwich?” he said finally as on stage Manzerotti extended his arms to the painted skies.
“We could arrange for it to be donated to the British Museum. Anonymously, of course. In a month, Lord Carmichael, it will be as if you never existed at all.”
“This way, Tonton,” the boy said, and led him up the last few steps to the attic. “You shall be taken care of here.”
Johannes could barely see, but if it was the pain or the gloom of the place, he could not tell. He guided himself up the stairs leaning his palm on the plaster walls. The love he had given to Manzerotti was the greatest glory of his life. His own talents with the trickeries and artistry of the scene room were insignificant to him, their only merit being that they allowed him to travel at Manzerotti’s side and do his bidding. Manzerotti traded government to government across Europe, charmed them into thinking him their own creature, but never loyal to anything other than his music and himself.
There had been a hard time in Paris three years ago, when Johannes had found himself cornered and alone. He had managed to get a message to Manzerotti, but no help had come. Three days later, having freed himself and left a cellar gory by his escape, he had made his way to Manzerotti’s rooms and fallen at his feet, asking to know why he had been forsaken. Manzerotti had paused in his practice only long enough to look at him, but had made no response and recommenced his work. After an hour Johannes had crawled away and presented himself at the proper time the following day. Manzerotti had greeted him as usual and the matter was never spoken of again. His belief was that he had been tested and succeeded.
Johannes thought of the moment when he had looked up at the Christ hanging above him in the church, sad and sorry. He had realized that he had been punished for his pride, that his role in loving God was not to sing His praises but to serve His true instrument—the boy with the black eyes. The sense of complete submission filled his heart and seemed to burst it open. His love poured from the cracked vessel of his soul in a flood. It was joy, freedom, a certainty that had never left him again.
The Creole boy pushed the door open in front of him. Johannes saw a shadowy attic; at a stove in its center an obscenely fat women was staring at something in a pan. Johannes’s fear suddenly screamed through him as she turned his way. He spun around to flee but found his passage blocked. Two boys and two men had followed them silently up the stairs. One raised a rough wooden truncheon and brought it down behind his ear. He fell to the ground.
The bravos were hysterical. As Sandwich helped Carmichael to his feet, feeling the man trembling under his coat, he looked down onto the stage. Manzerotti was bowing deeply, but lifted his head and looked directly into Sandwich’s eyes. The earl did not acknowledge the look but pushed Carmichael angrily out of the box and through the empty corridor and lobby while the ecstatic yells of the crowd still echoed behind them. He paused by the man outside.
“The woman?”
“We have Mrs. Mitchell, my lord.”
“And Manzerotti?”
“It is all arranged as you requested, sir.”
“Good. I am taking Lord Carmichael home.”
Johannes awoke to find himself bound to a greasy chair. The room was full of people. He hissed at them, and one or two of the ragged boys stepped back. He picked out the witch woman and the last of her little rats. By her side stood a tall man, dressed like a gentleman. He recognized him as the one who had caught hold of his leg the previous night. He was pleased to see an ugly bruise gilding his throat.
“Let me go.” The voice was between a hiss and a croak. “Let me go, and I will not hunt each and every one of you down. You do not know with what you meddle, you filth.”
Crowther stepped forward and slapped the man across his face with enough force to swing his head around.
“Oh yes, we do, Johannes. Carmichael, Mitchell, his friends, Manzerotti—all are taken.”
Johannes laughed and shook his head. “You will never touch my master. He is beyond you.” His eyes were bright, exultant.
Crowther said calmly, “If he escapes tonight, he will be taken tomorrow. He has nowhere to hide.”
Johannes’s eye was beginning to swell. “He does not need to hide!”
Crowther hit him again, and drew a gasp. The fat woman nodded her head in approval.
“Where are the two boys buried, Johannes?”
Johannes tasted the blood in his mouth. “In the tenter grounds where they stretch cloth off Holborn, unless the rats have eaten them already.”
Crowther struck him again. Then began to pull on his gloves. A voice or two in the crowd murmured; they began to creep forward. A woman in rags spat at the seated figure. Her yellow bile crawled down his face. A man balled his fists. Johannes looked around.
“You leave me here?”
Crowther felt the comfortable stretch of leather over his knuckles. “Yes, I do.” He turned to the fat woman. “You know where to take the body. Make sure it is before dawn.” She nodded and Crowther looked toward the prisoner again.
Crowther 02 - Anatomy of Murder Page 37
