by Skye Knizley
Price’s smile grew more smug. “Exactly. Let me know if you have any insight, my dear Miss MacLeod.”
Chastity continued to look around the room searching for any possible entrance to the laboratory. She noted the way steam wafted from some of the still roiling experiments and watched as it was drawn toward the northern corner of the room on some slight air current. She could see no cracks in the wall or nearby windows so let her attention fall on the half sized bookshelf in the corner of the room. Its construction matched neither the building nor the furniture and it seemed out of place amongst the towering shelves laden with books and the tables heavy with equipment.
She moved closer and ran her hands over the old wood like it was a long lost lover, her sensitive fingers feeling for any moveable components or a hidden catch. When she found none she knelt and looked at the haphazard arrangement of books on the top shelf. The last book on the shelf was an old leather tome titled The Northwest Passage by Sir John Franklin. Chastity suppressed a laugh and pulled on the book with one finger. There was a click and the entire shelf rotated out to reveal a room hidden on the other side.
She glanced at Price and said, “I believe this may be what you were looking for, Inspector. Care to join me?”
Inspector Price stood against the wall, a look of surprise on his handsome face. After a heartbeat he recovered and moved to look into the room.
“Very good work, Miss MacLeod, we'll make an inspector of you yet.”
“And you, dear Inspector, will one day be a decent reporter,” Chastity replied.
She stepped into the chamber and looked around. It was a storeroom, of sorts, with shelves of metal bars, spools of wire, barrels of salt, sulfur, and other chemicals sat against the back wall. On the opposite side were several jars of some kind of green fluid that she couldn’t identify. The whole room carried with it an acrid chemical stench.
“What is all this?” Price asked.
He crossed the room and picked up a bar of copper covered in a green patina. The bar was scored in several places as if chunks had been carved off with a saw.
Chastity joined him near the shelves. “That’s copper and the gray ones are zinc. Put them in the right acid and they create electricity. I’ve a friend who plays with electricity endlessly.”
Price put the bar back on the stack. “Davis was a scientist who specialized in electricity, at least according to the Chief Inspector. He was supposed to be working on some kind of new light.”
“He was doing more than dabbling with electricity. Sulfer, salt, acid, and green fluid that glows? We’re looking at something far more interesting than a new generator,” Chastity said.
She moved to the boarded window at the end of the room. It was sealed as well as the rest of the house, which explained the buildup of noxious fumes. Some people had never heard the concept of ventilation. And there was no other exit from the room.
“Be that as it may, Miss MacLeod, it isn’t helping me determine how Mr. Davis was killed and his head removed from a locked room,” Price said.
“Sadly, not,” Chastity said. “Perhaps we overlooked something.”
Price shook his head. “My men and I have been all over this place. There is no other exit and everything was locked from the inside.”
“There is no such thing as impossible, Inspector. There must be something we missed,” Chastity said.
She left the room and returned to the main laboratory. Once again nothing immediately jumped out at her, but she felt herself drawn back to the fireplace. Price was right, it was the only other option, short of magik and she hadn’t felt any in the air.
“Inspector, would you hand me that apron?” she asked.
Price entered and pulled an apron off the peg beside him. He brought it to Chastity who unfolded it onto the floor in front of the fireplace.
“What are you doing, Miss MacLeod?” Price asked.
“Taking a closer look at your fireplace theory,” Chastity replied.
She knelt on the apron and peered up into the chimney. Though it was made of brick, it had been coated in clay that was now dark and blackened with time. It was also surprisingly clean, with areas that looked as if they’d been recently scraped clean. She groped around until her hand closed on the poker and she used it to probe some of the ashed-over areas.
“Be careful, Miss MacLeod,” Price said.
“Yes, Inspector.”
She poked another likely looking spot and leaned back as a clump of soot fell and landed right on top of the other pile.
“It seems you might have been right,” she said.
“What do you mean?” Price asked.
Chastity pulled off her gloves which were now so covered in soot they would never come clean. “The ash and soot falls right in the middle of the fireplace, regardless of where it falls from. Someone, a very thin someone, could have climbed the chimney and left no evidence in the firebox. I find it unlikely, but possible.”
“I’ll be damned. You figured that out with a poker?”
Chastity smiled. “It was your idea. A friend of mine says ‘once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains must be the truth.”
Price knelt and looked up the chimney himself. “I was hoping there was another answer, I don’t relish the idea of trying to track this person.”
“What person?” Chastity asked.
“The dwarf that did this,” Price replied.
“Oh, Inspector Price!” Chastity laughed. “I think we need a few more clues to sort this, don’t you?”
Price wiped his hands on a kerchief from his pocket. “I may, but I think this is where your involvement ends.”
Chastity frowned. “But—”
“No buts, Miss MacLeod, I appreciate your assistance, but this is a matter for the police, not the Dispatch. I’ll escort you out, I’ve got to get some men looking for our suspect anyway.”
Chastity could tell by the look on his face that Price would brook no argument. She allowed herself to be led outside and stood by while Price instructed his men to begin asking around for the potential suspect. The men were off like they’d been shot from a cannon and soon she was alone again with Price.
“What do you plan to do next?” she asked.
“The same as my men,” Price said. “Ask around for any leads. Good day, Miss MacLeod.”
“Good day, Inspector,” Chastity said.
He tipped his hat and started off at a policeman’s pace.
Chastity frowned. Price was clearly good at his job, he’d seen the fireplace as the likely point of entrance right off, but he was unused to London or the uniqueness of some of the populace.
She turned back down the lane toward the main street where several coaches were waiting. She stepped aboard a plain Hansom cab and settled in.
“Whitechapel, if you please,” she said.
“Yes ma’am,” the driver replied.
A HARD, COLD rain was falling by the time the stagecoach stopped near 123 Whitechapel Road. Though you wouldn’t know it from walking the high street, which was thronged with well-dressed middle class patrons taking in the curiosities, tea shops and pubs, Whitechapel had devolved over the years into one of London’s slums. The poverty stricken, sick and criminal gravitated to its maze of alleys and courtyards, away from the prying eyes of authority.
Chastity stepped down onto the sidewalk and hurried toward a sign that read “Diablo Bros. Human Novelties.” She ducked inside with water dripping from her parasol and let her eyes adjust. Though lit with several lanterns, the room was made gloomy by the dark wooden walls covered in circus posters and the haze of tobacco smoke. Dozens of glass bottles and displays held oddities ranging from two-head cow fetuses to shrunken heads, a preview of the more extreme displays within the show itself.
“Och, you look half-drowned, lass,” a voice said.
Chastity closed her parasol and set it aside. “I’m sorry, it is a bit wet outside. I wasn’t expecting a London downpour today.”
A slender woman in a striped white dress appeared from behind the counter and handed her a cloth.
“Dry yourself, girl, before you catch your death of cold.”
Chastity accepted the cloth with a smile and dried herself as best she could. When she was done she handed the cloth back.
“Thank you.”
The woman dropped the cloth into a basket. “You’re welcome, dear. And welcome to Diablo Brothers Human Novelties. You may call me Lilith. We have dozens of human novelties and freaks to amaze and terrify you and a ticket is just sixpence. Will you dare to enter?”
Chastity opened her purse and laid several coins on the counter. “Thank you. Can you tell me if the Thin Man is here today?”
Lilith took the coin and placed a paper ticket on the counter. “You’ve seen our show before, then. No, his stage is dark today, why?”
“I make a point of seeing the newest shows, it’s a sort of hobby. My name is Chastity MacLeod, I’m with the Dispatch. I’m working on a story about so-called freaks and was hoping to do an interview with him. I don’t suppose you could give me his real name or let me know where to find him?” Chastity asked.
Lilith smiled. “For the newspaper? I suppose it would be alright. His name is Calvin Moody and you can find him either above the cobbler’s shop three streets east of here or at the Vine Tavern on Mile End Road.”
Chastity took the ticket and placed it inside her purse. “Thank you, Lilith. I’ll make sure to mention you in the article.”
“You don’t want to see the show?” Lilith asked.
Chastity picked up her parasol. “I’ve another show to see today. Thank you again for your time.”
The walk toward the cobbler’s shop was a slow and muddy one consisting mostly of noisome alleyways and side streets choked with urchins trying to keep out of the rain. Chastity had to slap several ambitious hands away from her purse before reaching the small green awning in front of JW Reynolds Cobblers. The front windows were half full with stylish shoes and hand-painted signs proclaiming any shoe was available within three days.
An older man, possibly Mr. Reynolds himself, waved from inside the shop and Chastity smiled at him before heading up the stairs to the apartments. Many shopkeepers lived above their stores; crafty ones also rented out apartment spaces as a way to keep their stores open in leaner times.
The stairs emptied out into a narrow corridor with four windows down one side and two doors in the other. Chastity knocked politely on the nearest door and waited. It opened a crack and a middle aged woman with her hair in a loose bun peered out.
“Can I help you?”
Her accent made it sound like “Kin eh help ye?”
“Good afternoon, mum, I’m looking for Calvin, Mr. Moody,” Chastity replied.
“He’s next door,” the woman replied.
She slammed the door on Chastity’s “thank you” and Chastity stepped lightly down the hallway to the other door. She rapped again and stood rocking one foot back and forth. She knocked again when no one answered then tested the knob. The door opened on hinges rusted by the damp and Chastity looked into a narrow apartment with nothing but a clutter of books, a single bed, table with chairs and a stove dark with cold. There was no sign of Moody or that he’d even been there recently. Chastity entered and closed the door behind her, leaving it open a crack rather than forcing it shut.
She first checked the bedding and found it to be both filthy and empty of anything of use save for a few strands of long blonde hair. By all accounts Moody was a ginger and most definitely male. Likely the hair belonged to an intimate lady-friend or one of the few of the city’s fanatics attracted to the fame of “freaks”.
Chastity folded the hair into a scrap of paper from her notebook then checked the stove. As she’d suspected from the door, it was cold, but the interior was stuffed not with coal ash, but with scraps of charred paper. She placed them one at a time onto the stove top and shuffled them around like pieces from a puzzle. Most were articles from the Times and Dispatch Crime and Punishment section, but others were from the small ads. One in particular, though badly charred, read “The Slender Man Wanted” with a description of the man needed and an address on the north side of the city.
Whoever placed this advert may as well have addressed it to Moody, Chastity thought. No one else could possibly fit the bill.
She broke off the worst of the char and added the advert to her purse. When she straightened, she noticed that her breath was coming in plumes; the room had grown increasingly cold while she worked. She moved to the window, surprised to find it was not fogged over, but rather covered in a thin film of ice. She wiped it away enough to see and was surprised to see it was still only raining.
“Passing strange,” she muttered. “Peculiar, to say the least.”
She turned and huffed on the room’s single mirror. It fogged over slowly and froze as if the room were far colder than it should be. With her curiosity piqued, Chastity began another search of the room, this time searching for the spell or device that was putting such chill in the air. After several minutes with nothing but knees bruised from checking under the furniture, she frowned and dropped into a chair. By now her fingers were growing numb from the cold and she was beginning to shiver. She considered lighting the stove while she searched, but that was sure to be noticed when Moody returned. She resolved to leave and get one of the runners to watch the place on the off chance that Moody came back, when she heard a noise. A sort of odd shuffling, slithering noise that came from the wall beside her. She pressed her ear to the wall and the noise got louder, moving back and forth inside the wall, a whisper of sound barely audible above the patter of rain and the gurgle of gutters outside. It carried with it a quality that made the hair stand on the back of her neck and a chill slither down her spine in time with the sound. She placed a hand on the wall and tried to follow the noise as it moved back and forth, up and down. She could feel movement through the plaster and knew it wasn’t her imagination.
“Oi! What are ye doin’ in here?” a voice roared.
Chastity jerked away from the wall as if it was on fire and turned to face the doorway. A large man dressed in a suit and sopping wet greatcoat stood in the doorway.
“I’m sorry,” Chastity said. “I was looking for Mr. Moody. I don’t think that is you.”
“Of course not, do I look like a freak to you?” the man asked. “What d’you want ‘im for?”
Chastity fought for composure. The hypnotic noise and her surprise at the man’s presence had her feeling like a child caught stealing from the apple cart. She patted her hair back into place and favored him with her best smile.
“I am Chastity MacLeod from the Dispatch. I was hoping to catch up with Mr. Moody for an interview. Have you seen him?”
The man shook his head. “He ain’t been in for a few days and he’s two weeks behind on the room. I’m here to toss his things into the street, I got payin’ customers waitin’ for this place.”
Chastity frowned. This was her most solid lead, with any luck, Moody would come back, but not if his meager belongings were pitched into the gutter. “Perhaps I could settle his bill? How much does he owe?”
It was the man’s turn to frown. He looked Chastity up and down and glared at her with dark eyes. “What’s a spit of a girl like you want to pay the freak’s bill for? You got eyes for ’im?”
Chastity looked away, feigning embarrassment. “Of course not, I just want the interview. If you throw his things away he won’t come back and I might never catch up with him. It’s so hard for a lady to break a story.”
She looked back at him with tears in her eyes. “Can you help me?”
The man’s frown softened. “Don’t be pouring no tears on me, lass. I can’t let ye rent the place, but if you pay half ‘is back rent I’ll give him another day to pay the rest. Can’t say fairer than that.”
Chastity smiled and reached for her purse. “Thank you, thank you so much! What does he owe you?”
The man rubbed his scruffy beard with a sound like a brush on old metal. “Call it three shillings and be done with it.”
Chastity presented the coins and the man bit into the first one to satisfy himself it was real. The fact it was already covered in old bite marks didn’t seem to mean anything.
“Right. I’ll leave the door open for him, but if he doesn’t pay the rest he’s out on ‘is ear and so’s your story.”
“Thank you, truly,” Chastity said.
She watched the man leave, then turned back to the wall, but the sound she’d heard was gone with not even a hint it had ever existed.
THE RAIN CONTINUED unabated, muddying the streets and turning the afternoon slop into a stinking mess that slid along the gutters like rotten molasses. Chastity stepped over a particularly noisome puddle and splashed down the walkway to the entrance to the church. A handful of the faithful looked up when she stepped into the sacristy, but lost interest when she vanished through the door at the back. Few knew what was really within; most knew not to ask, it was understood whatever was beyond that door was “church business”.
She reached the bottom of the stairs a moment later and walked straight into Malachi who was carrying a bundle of scrolls that spilled around him like snowflakes.
“Oh! Malachi I am so sorry,” Chastity exclaimed.
She extended a hand and Malachi stared at it blankly before looking up at her.
“What is the hurry, sister?”
Chastity paused. She wasn’t sure she was ready to tell anyone about the phantom sound. Not until she knew what she was talking about.
“I’m soaking wet,” she said. “I just want to get out of these wet clothes and into a hot lavender bath. Can I help you up?”
Malachi took her hand and she hauled him to his feet. He then began to gather up his scrolls, holding them in a precarious armload he would no doubt drop again as soon as he moved.
“Thank you. I was just on my way back to the library, Father William has me researching the incident outside Darmstadt fifty years ago and he isn’t taking no for an answer.”
