by LENOX, KIM
For a moment she feared she’d have to continue on to the Horn of Plenty or the Brittania, but thankfully, though she didn’t see Lizzy or Catherine, she found the familiar face of one who might be able to tell her what she wished to know.
“Mrs. Scott?” She sidled between the tables. “Hello—do you remember me from the hospital?”
Mrs. Scott had five sturdy sons ranging in age from eight to eighteen who worked at any job they could find, be that laying brick, peddling newspapers or blacking boots. In Elena’s brief time at the hospital, she’d met all but one of them for various injuries, but rarely sickness.
“Oh-ay . . . ’at you, Nurse Whitney? Come ’ave a seat. Yes, come.”
With the heel of her shoe, Mrs. Scott shoved out an empty chair. She sat with a younger woman, neatly dressed in a black, long-sleeved dress and a black felt cap. On the table before them sat stout, earthenware mugs and two half-eaten meat pies, wrapped in greasy newspaper.
“Good morning to you both.” Elena sat down and placed her bag securely on her lap.
Mrs. Scott grinned. “Say, ’ave you met Mary? No? This is Mary Kelly, a good friend of mine from Miller’s Court. The two of you sort of look like each other, ay?”
“Hello Mary.” Elena smiled and nodded at the girl, who was strikingly pretty, with blond hair and mischievous blue eyes. “So good to make your acquaintance. Mrs. Scott, how is Jimmy’s hand?”
“So much improved, thanks to you and ’at fine Dr. ’arcourt. I been tellin’ anyone who’ll listen, too, what fine attention we got at the ’ospital.”
“Pint for you, miss?” called one of the barmaids.
Elena nodded, then to Mrs. Scott, said, “I’m so glad Jimmy’s recovering. Say, I stopped by to see if I could find one of my patients. Might you know Lizzy Harper, or her friend Catherine Eddowes?”
Mrs. Scott nodded. “Oh, ay. I know Kate all right. It’s still a bit early for ’er to be out and about.” The woman leaned toward Elena and chuckled. “Not that I’m one to judge, but when I saw ’er last night, she could barely put one ’eel in front of the other. In the end the coppers ’auled her off to Bishopsgate.”
The barmaid slid a mug in front of her, and Elena provided the necessary coin for payment.
“Really? That bad off?” Elena tried to conceal her disappointment. So Catherine hadn’t used the money to safely board for the night. Instead she’d been out drinking and getting herself arrested.
Mrs. Scott chuckled jovially, rocking back to her chair. “Old girl’s probably still sleepin’ it off in ’er cell.”
At least, though, if Mrs. Eddowes spent the night in a jail cell she was safe. What about young Lizzy?
“Be right back,” said Mary, pulling a small, leather purse from her waistband. “Got to settle part of me arrears with Geneva, else they won’t let me in the door tonight.”
She set off in the direction of the bar.
Elena asked Mrs. Scott, “Was Lizzy with Catherine when you saw her last night?”
“Lizzy . . .” The woman squinted in thought. “Lizzy with the curly red hair? Young thing, lives with one of them strappin’ navvies over off Fashion?”
“That’s her.” Elena lifted her mug and took a sip. She had not acquired a taste for stout, especially not as a midday beverage, but kept a grimace from her face.
“Not last night, but if we’re talkin’ about the same girl, p’raps I saw ’er just this morning on the back of a cart, ’eaded toward Aldgate. Lots of folks going that way this morning. Say, you did ’ear the news, didn’t you?”
“I did.”
The woman shook her head, her expression a mix of revulsion and fear. “Word on the street is that those women were butchered, Nurse Whitney. Butchered like animals.”
“Have you heard the names of the victims?”
“We’re all waitin to ’ear who they are, miss, and find out whether they are kith or kin. Either way, everyone’s certain they’ll be next, once night falls again. It’s a sorry thing, livin’ on these streets.”
“I know, it’s terrible. Worse than terrible.” Elena frowned. “And so you think Lizzy went toward Aldgate?”
“I ’ear they’re ’avin a public meeting down there, and one up in Victoria Park, ’oping to organize and get the police to do something more than what they been doin’ ”
“I see.” Elena, crossing one leg of the other, nodded, while listening intently.
“Those in charge don’t care about us over in this part of the city. Not unless we all band t’gether and make some noise. I’ll be ’eaded ’at way meself after I finish me breakfast.”
“Perhaps I’ll see you there, then.” Elena stood.
“Oh, say—” Mrs. Scott glanced pointedly at Elena’s mug, still filled to the brim. “Do ye mind?”
“Not at all.”
She turned, and at the same moment, a large wall of a man stood up from the table beside hers, blocking her exit.
“Morning, lovely.” He had high, pronounced cheekbones, a dark mustache and black eyes, and stood almost a head taller than she. His words were heavily accented—Eastern European, she believed, from her experience at the hospital. “Saw you walk by. Was hoping to introduce myself.”
Elena met his gaze directly. “I’m sorry, I’m on my way out.”
“I shall make it worth your while.”
Mrs. Scott interjected, “She’s not your sort, Ludwig. Let ’er pass.”
He didn’t budge.
“Truly sir. I’ve somewhere else to be.”
She sidestepped him, only to have his hand grip her forearm and yank her toward him.
“Oh, say here!” bellowed Mrs. Scott, pushing herself up from her table. “Get your hands off her.”
The men at his table guffawed loudly.
Elena froze and stared down to where he gripped her. She wasn’t naive about the East End, or what could happen on its streets, day or night. She fully realized what chances she took in coming here.
“Please remove your hand from my arm.”
“Don’t you speak so clean and fancy?” he sneered, having lost all pretense of politeness. “Sorry, princess. Not until you share a pint with me and my friends.”
Mary, who had been leaning against the bar, turned and bravely wedged herself between them. “Let her go, Ludwig.”
His fist swung high—
Mary’s arms went up to defend herself.
“No!” Elena shouted.
“Severin Antoniovich,” a man’s voice interjected in a quietly commanding voice. The pub went silent.
Elena glanced aside—
Lord Black sat in a chair just a few feet from them, his dark hair a midnight cascade over his shoulders, and his icy gaze fixed on her assailant.
Chapter Eight
Exclamations and curses rose up around the room. Shock reverberated through Elena. How could Lord Black, sitting just there, have gone unnoticed until now?
The smallest, most provocative of smiles turned his lips. Never breaking gaze with the man, he leaned forward in his chair and slowly stood to his full, impressive height. Waning light gleamed off the rich fabric that fashioned the lapel of his coat. The pub seemed like a dingy coal bin in comparison to his dark splendor.
“I believe you’d like to remove your hand from the lady,” he murmured, staring intently into the man’s eyes. “Wouldn’t you, Severin?”
Ludwig or Severin, or whatever the man’s name was, gave an anguished shout and released her. He staggered backward, his eyes wide and unfocused, and gripped his hand as if in excruciating pain, only to be shoved by Mary in the opposite direction.
Archer retrieved his hat from the table and took Elena’s elbow. With no change of expression, he escorted her toward the door. As they passed through, into the midday light, Mrs. Scott and Mary scuttled out behind them—Mrs. Scott, with a sloshing pint clutched in one hand, and her unfinished meat pie in the other.
“Thank you, sir,” Mary called, grinning.
�
�Be seein’ you soon, Nurse Whitney,” hollered Mrs. Scott.
Elena watched both women hurry across the street to disappear into the crowd on the far sidewalk.
Left alone with her guardian, she braced herself, for certainly he would demand an explanation. She had been so careful leaving Black House. How had he followed her all this way without her knowing?
But he didn’t say a word. Nor did he release her elbow. His quiet intensity, as they progressed down the crowded street, sent a dark thrill of anticipation through her. She feared his fury, but in some morbidly torturous way she craved any audience with him.
Seeking to gauge the gravity of her situation, she glanced up beneath the deep brim of his hat.
“How long were you there before all that ugliness began?”
He met her inquiring gaze with a level one. “Long enough to realize you’ve done this sort of thing before. And don’t tell me you think you could have handled that yourself. I don’t want to hear it.”
She hated to admit how relieved she’d been, seeing him inside the Ten Bells, but why pretend otherwise?
“I am glad you were there.”
“I’m not glad you were there,” he responded darkly.
“I know,” she admitted. “And I understand why, really I do. But it was important for me to find someone today. How did you know where I’d gone?”
“Leeson saw you leave Black House, dressed like that. He is in a panic that you went out unaccompanied. Do you know how dangerous the city is today?”
She nodded. “I shall have to thank Mr. Leeson for his kind concern.”
Lord Black guided her around a buckled slab of sidewalk and in doing so, moved his hand from her elbow to the small of her back. He walked close to her, so close at times his trousers brushed against her skirts. Lord help her, he excited her with his presence, even if he was angry.
Pedestrians thronged alongside them, and in the opposite direction. Most of them, especially the ladies, stole a second glance at the handsome gentleman with the exotic long hair and elegant clothing. A few even turned in a half circle to gawk as he moved past.
One thing Elena had learned in her time working at the hospital was that the East End was an uncommon place and there were uncommon sights to be seen everywhere within it, at all hours of the day or night. In some inexplicable way, he fit in perfectly here.
She said, “Back there, at the Ten Bells, the ladies called that man Ludwig. You called him something else.”
“I overheard something one of his friends said,” he responded vaguely, looking ahead over the crowd. “I simply took the chance I could get his attention with it.”
“That was remarkable, the way you looked at him and he—”
“Who is it you are here today trying to find?”
“A girl, Lizzy Harper.”
“She is someone you are very close to?”
“Not really,” Elena confessed. “Actually, I met her only yesterday at the hospital. She was one of my patients. I don’t know why, but somehow I felt very connected to her. You know how it is with some people.”
“I suppose I don’t,” he answered coolly.
Despite his attractiveness, it was easy to see why he wouldn’t. While “hauteur” was no accurate description—for he was not arrogant in his mannerisms or speech—he emanated inaccessibility, as if every emotion and impulse were kept behind an impenetrable wall. Elena could not help but wonder what he would be like if that wall were destroyed.
She said, “I’m worried about her, and the friend she was supposed to stay with last night. I know it’s foolish. But when I heard there were two more murders . . .”
He didn’t answer, but his jaw tensed visibly.
Across the street, a row of narrow tables had been set out on the sidewalk. Solemnly dressed women pressed handbills into the hands of passersby. Beside them was propped a large sign bearing the words WHITECHAPEL VIGILANCE COMMITTEE.
They shouted out into the crowd, “Ladies! All of you ladies, yes, you there, and you. Please come and sign the petition. A petition that will be presented to our most gracious lady, Queen Victoria. Let us demand the closure of all wicked houses of sin and impurity in our city!”
“Do you wish to sign the petition?” Lord Black asked in a cordial tone.
“Thank you, but no.”
His dark brow lifted. “Why not?”
“It’s not wickedness that drives these women to the street; it is desperation and poverty. I’ll sign any petition that proposes some solution to those problems. Oh, dear. Look at all these people.”
They had arrived at the juncture with Whitechapel Road. Though before, the sidewalks had been crowded, now there was barely room to walk. Hundreds, if not thousands of people jammed the street, to such an extent that the thoroughfare appeared to be a bobbing sea of heads and hats, flowing toward Aldgate.
She said, “They’re trying to get a look at the places where those women were killed.”
“So it appears,” he answered, frowning.
Street vendors, normally uncommon in this part of the neighborhood, had followed the crowd and set up their carts off to the side. They sold steaming coffee, tea and a variety of cakes, fruits and nuts.
Lord Black scowled like the devil at a passel of children and a barking dog who circled around them.
“Perhaps the best thing we can do if you’ve any hope whatsoever of finding your girl, Lizzy, is to stay in one spot. Perhaps we could sit over there on that bit of half wall. At least for a time. I’ve an appointment this afternoon.”
Inwardly Elena was stunned. She’d assumed he was taking her to the train station so he could escort her directly home. Instead, he was staying with her to watch for Lizzy. Perhaps Lord Black wasn’t the devil.
“She’s on a crutch, so I think she’d stay to the outer edge of the crowd, so yes, let’s do that.” Elena smiled her gratefulness. She touched her hand against his forearm. “Just a moment, if you will.”
She darted away into the crowd, pressing through the shabbiest of citizens, toward one of the vendors.
For a moment Archer lost her, but he quickly spotted the crimson bird on her hat. Keeping his sites on her, he made his way to the wall and seated himself on the edge of its mortar. There was just enough space for the two of them, for a host of others lined the wall as well, watching the spectacle in the street.
Her smile upon returning sent his stomach muscles into clenching. In her gloved hand, she held out a small paper envelope. “I wanted some sweets. I bought some for you too.”
They were cachous, identical to the ones he’d seen clenched in the hands of a dead woman the night before.
“What’s wrong?” Her brows furrowed. “Oh, dear, you dislike peppermint.”
He met her gaze directly. “I don’t like how things ended between us this morning.”
She looked away, flushing, and placed one of the cachous between her lips. “Neither do I.”
He confessed, “I only want the best for you.”
“I know,” she answered, perching herself upon the wall beside him, closer than would be proper on the other side of town. He wasn’t at all sorry. “But obviously we’ve different ideas of what that should be.”
“I . . . admire your ambition and your selflessness in wishing to help others who cannot help themselves,” Archer ceded, forcing the words, which were true, but not very easy to say, from his lips.
Her lovely features showed surprise, and pleasure. “You do?”
Being ancient as time itself, he didn’t subscribe to so-called contemporary ideas about Elena’s sex. He had known many scholarly and powerful women. Olympias. Cleopatra. Boudaccia. Women were capable of the same greatnesses as men. Of course, he couldn’t tell her that. Such forthrightness would not serve his current purposes—namely, to keep her safe, happy and alive for the next six or seven decades, even if he were not present to witness what he vowed would be a contented and happy life for her. He had not humiliated himself, intervening
to give her a second chance, only for her to get herself killed just a few blocks away from the squalid street where he’d first found her. He wanted better things for her than Whitechapel, and the burden of its hopelessly lost inhabitants.
He added, “At the same time I am responsible for your future.”
Her face fell, in obvious recollection of their morning discussion and his announcement that he wished her to marry.
With a sigh she tugged at the cuff of her glove, and he glimpsed the very outermost border of her serpent tattoo.
She said in a soft voice, “We still have had no real opportunity to talk and become acquainted with each other. Tell me, how did your responsibility for my well-being come about? How did you know my father?”
“I knew him . . . only in passing.”
In passing, yes. Depending on how one defined the word, he was either a bloody liar or telling the absolute truth.
Disappointment showed plainly on her face. “You weren’t friends, then?”
“Just acquaintances, really.”
Her brow furrowed beneath the brim of her hat. “If you weren’t a friend or relative, why did he choose you as my guardian?”
“Because, Miss Whitney, there was no one else.”
Her eyes glazed with sudden tears. God, he was a bastard through and through.
“You met him in your travels, then?”
He nodded. Again, the truth depended on one’s definition of “travels.”
“Had you and I met before?”
“No.”
Her voice went husky. “Was my father truly so alone?”
Archer pulled a handkerchief from his chest pocket. When he handed it to her, she grasped both the handkerchief and his hand with both of hers.
“Not at all,” he assured her. “He had your mother, and then you, and of course all the people of the villages he served. He enjoyed the deepest satisfaction throughout his life.”
