Keeper of Pleas

by A. Wendeberg

  ‘Would you, without exception, know if a tree was taken?’

  ‘Of course I would!’

  ‘Hm,’ Sévère nodded slowly. ‘You don’t happen to have Fuller’s Earth on your premises, do you?’

  MacDoughall leant back, blinked, and then began to holler with laughter. His wife kicked him under the table and he shut his mouth instantly. Wiping the tears from his eyes he said, ‘Coroner, if I had found Fuller’s Earth in my backyard, I wouldn’t be sitting here.’

  ‘You wouldn’t?’ Mrs MacDoughall asked, her brow knitted.

  ‘I wouldn’t. You and I and the bairns would be…would be…. Well, wherever we would be, we’d have plush pillows under our arses.’

  Celia McDoughall’s eyes shot from her husband’s face to Mary’s and Sévère’s, and back to her husband again. She set her chin, looked down at her child and swallowed. ‘You should tell them,’ she whispered.

  Sévère’s tapping foot stilled abruptly.

  ‘What about?’ McDoughall asked, rather puzzled.

  His wife sighed, whisked a stray curl from her eyes and said, ‘The cledge.’

  ‘Oh. That.’ McDougall’s hand shot up to his ear and he began to scratch it again. ‘The Fuller’s Earth deposit is located at eighteen to twenty-six yards depth. The mineable portion of it, anyway. But, there are several overlying strata of clay and sand. And a very thin layer of Fuller’s Earth, only about a foot thick, often less. The diggers call it the cledge. It’s useless to them because neighbouring sands and clays insinuate themselves within it.’

  ‘At what depth can one find this cledge?’ Sévère asked.

  ‘Four to six feet.’

  ❧

  ‘Four to six feet is a nice depth to bury a corpse,’ Mary said, as they walked down the street toward Redhill church.

  ‘Do you have experience with burying corpses?’

  ‘Not as yet.

  ‘I’m glad of it.’ Sévère tapped his cane hard against the cobblestones. ‘MacDoughall sounded very much like a miner when he talked about the cledge. “Insinuated” and “strata” don’t seem to be terms a gardener would be using. And she lied about the older child. Wherever he or she was, it wasn’t in school. Besides, what was that about? “I am with child and need to use your privy.” And, “My grandfather was a beekeeper.”’

  She poked him with her elbow. ‘Imagine, Sévère, that I got lost on the way to the privy and that, completely by accident, I peeked into the pantry, the family’s bedroom, and around the backyard. And so, coincidentally, I discovered the bee skeps, and wondered why the skeps were exposed to wind and rain. No experienced beekeeper would allow that, most certainly not in winter. Oh, and by the way, imagine that the bedroom I accidentally stumbled into had a large bed for the parents and the little one, plus a small mattress for the oldest child — which was occupied.’

  ‘By the child?’

  ‘Yes. He’s ill. A cold, I believe. He thinks I’m an angel. And I’m absolutely sure no one else lives in that house or on the premises, such as a sister of the wife or husband, or tenants. Celia MacDoughall is too young to have given birth to nine dead children plus the two she has. You’ll have to look for the culprit elsewhere.’

  Sévère refrained from commenting on the fact that he had not thought of asking about tenants or relatives living with the MacDoughalls, and that Mary had surprised him yet again.

  ‘You are welcome,’ Mary said. ‘Where are we going now?’

  ‘Public house,’ he grumbled.

  ‘May I recommend you treat me like the bad-tempered husband you are, while I make big, watery eyes at the innkeeper?’

  ‘To extract all kinds of hearsay from the poor man?’

  ‘Precisely. I expect I must tell him that I fear for the life of my unborn child, because my husband is a brute. I’ll ask him if he has ever heard of such a thing as infanticide, because I read about it in the papers a few days ago.’ She smiled at him. ‘And I’m utterly and thoroughly upset. A hysteric attack is threatening.’

  ‘Under these circumstances, you may.’

  The innkeeper, naturally, was shocked. Sévère treated Mary as though she didn’t deserve to walk the face of Earth, and Mary treated the innkeeper as though he were her would-be saviour.

  At some point, a constable entered and asked Sévère to follow him to the inspector’s office. He obeyed without making a fuss, while his wife held on to the innkeeper’s large and hairy paw.

  ❧

  ‘Coroner Sévère, why did you not come to us directly? We would have been able to answer all your questions regarding the nursery or any cases of infanticide in Redhill.’ The inspector was still pacing up and down in front of his desk. His mutton chops stood out as if struck by lightning.

  It had taken Sévère a good fifteen minutes to convince the police that he was indeed Coroner of Eastern Middlesex, and that his papers were genuine.

  ‘What about this woman, then? Is she your wife?’

  ‘She’s my assistant and, at present, she is interrogating the innkeeper.’

  ‘You have no jurisdiction here,’ the inspector pointed out.

  ‘The bodies were found in my district and the evidence shows that the offender might have committed the murders here in Redhill. Hence, I am fully within my rights to conduct an investigation in your district.’

  ‘You could have notified us.’

  ‘I was on my way to the police station,’ Sévère lied. ‘And now that I am here, I would greatly appreciate if you could provide further information on the quarry, and fetch your files for me. I need to know about all cases of infanticide, concealed birth, adultery, rape, or the death of a child by neglect.’

  ❧

  With a belch, the train pulled out of Redhill and huffed northward.

  ‘You were not surprised when the police arrived,’ Mary said.

  ‘I saw the innkeeper slipping a note to one of his boys. Both were looking at me as if I were the devil. I was sure the boy would go straight to the local police office. What mysteries did the innkeeper reveal to you while you were squeezing the lifeblood from his hands?’

  She pressed her palms to her tired eyes, and sighed impatiently. ‘He told me to dump you, and marry him.’ She dropped her hands into her lap and shrugged. ‘Whenever I tried to direct our conversation to gossip or infanticides or women who might have been in the family way, but were never seen with an infant, he said that Redhill is so much prettier than London, that he’s a fine specimen of a man, and that he’s saved enough money to support a woman like me. We could give your child to a wet nurse and start anew. Gah!’

  ‘Unfortunate,’ Sévère noted and rested his elbows on his thighs. ‘Now the interesting information, if you please.’

  ‘Alexander Easy died…beneath me.’

  ‘I thought so. Did he scream?’

  ‘He moaned. Clients do so quite regularly,’ she provided. ‘He did not scream. But he grabbed his chest, his face crumpled, and he died silently.’

  Sévère scowled.

  ‘You paid for my honesty. Did you forget?’ she asked sweetly.

  He doubted he would ever forget that. ‘Ah. So that’s where the peculiar burn in my backside comes from. How very interesting.’

  ‘You asked for it, Sévère.’

  ‘Mr Sévère, if you please. Or Coroner Sévère.’

  ‘You asked for it, Sévère.’

  His fist hit the window. ‘I did not ask for being flogged senseless!’

  ‘You did not lose your senses during the procedure. Not once. A lot more pain is needed for a man to lose his senses. Or a woman, for that matter. You asked for my honesty and I gave it to you. I still do. One word from you is enough to stop it. Do you want me to lie?’

  His jaws tensed. His eyes gleamed with anger.

  She shifted in her seat. ‘I see. You do want me to lie. You want me to give you the feeling that you are stronger in body and mind and heart than I am. You would feel better if I allowed you to believe tha
t I am a low human being because I sell my body to men like you. I should be ashamed so that you can go on feeling noble.’

  Sévère cleared his throat. ‘Why did you humiliate me?’

  ‘Because you were planning to humiliate me. It’s what whores are for: to receive humiliation. I merely showed you how it feels, allowing you to reconsider your plans.’ Her cheeks and chest felt uncomfortably warm. She exhaled her tension, uncurled her fingers, and stared out the window.

  ‘Tell me about Easy’s death,’ he said hoarsely.

  Without looking at him, she said, ‘Alexander Easy grabbed his chest. His face spoke of the pain he was in, but he said nothing. Spittle was dripping from his mouth. He didn’t breathe. I put my ear to his chest, but found no heartbeat. He began to twitch, then.’

  ‘Twitch? Did he fight?’

  ‘The body always fights death. Have you never seen a living thing die? A beheaded chicken? A cow whose brains have been bashed in with a sledgehammer? Alexander Easy’s body twitched, and I fetched Bobbie and the madam.’

  ‘Who is Bobbie?’

  ‘He takes care of clients who believe they don’t need to pay. He hid when you and Inspector Height arrived.’ She looked at him now, but found no surprise in his face.

  ‘What happened then?’

  ‘Well.’ She leant back and crossed her arms over her chest.

  ‘I warn you, Miss Mary. Stop traipsing around it. Spit it out already!’

  ‘It’s delicate.’

  ‘The unlawful disposal of a body usually is.’

  She narrowed her eyes at him. ‘I retreated to another room, inserted a tube into my vagina and washed Mr Easy’s semen out of me with a caustic solution to prevent pregnancy. If you must know.’

  Despite himself, Sévère blushed. ‘Go on.’

  ‘When I showed Bobbie and the madam the dead man in my bed, they asked what had happened. I told them the truth. They said I should swiftly take care of my business — meaning I should douche to avoid getting with child. It usually takes me a few moments only, but that night I was…a little beside myself. I spilt most of the liquid and had to mix it anew before rinsing myself with some difficulty. I don’t know how long it took, but certainly not more than half an hour. When I returned to my room, Mr Easy was gone, the sheets were gone, and the madam said that Bobbie had taken care of things.’

  ‘And of course you are completely and utterly innocent,’ Sévère muttered.

  She snorted. ‘Little imagination is needed to know that Bobbie disposed of the corpse.’

  ‘And you did nothing about it.’

  ‘It was done. Reporting the incident to the police wouldn’t have accomplished anything. The man was dead as a doornail and, most likely, already floating down the Thames.’

  ‘What about his family? Did you not think someone might miss him?’ Sévère asked.

  ‘No. Alexander Easy told me he was a widower.’

  ‘He could have had children.’

  ‘He didn’t. He said, “My house is empty. My arms are empty.” This man was utterly alone. He had no one and no one missed him.’

  ‘You surprise me, Miss Mary.’

  She shrugged. It did not interest her.

  ‘You can read and you seem to devour information. Knowledge. That’s very unusual for a woman like you.’

  ‘A woman like me?’

  ‘I should have said, “unusual for a prostitute.” But no matter your profession, it seems impossible to categorise you.’

  ‘You are utterly and entirely wrong. Any dimwitted onlooker would place me into one of several categories in the blink of an eye: a female, well-dressed, in the company of a gentleman, and hence, untouchable. Let’s remove you from the picture for a moment, and the categories begin to shift. She’s pretty. Is she married? May I court her? Let’s imagine I pull a strand of my hair down and let it rest on my shoulder. And let’s imagine I tear a button from my dress. The upper-most one. She’s a tad disheveled. Improper. Might she be a whore?’

  With her index finger, Mary drew a face onto the fogged-up window. It had long, pinned-up hair, large eyes and a tongue sticking out of a full-lipped mouth. ‘You see, Sévère, I am a woman and thus more subject to the stupid opinion of others than any man ever will be. So why should I regard opinions as worthy of my attention?’

  ‘What about the opinions of your clients?’

  ‘That is an entirely different matter. I want them to be satisfied, and not merely to have an opinion of me. I don’t want them to say, “It was good,” or, “it was boring.” I want them to… I want them to sigh deeply and say, “It was… Oh, words fail me. I can’t describe it. You have to see for yourself. You have to go to her, my friend.”’

  ‘And then you whip them?’

  Mary burst out laughing, caught her breath, and demurely folded her hands in her lap. ‘No need. More often than not, I tell them I can’t see them. That’s worse than receiving a good whipping.’

  ‘Why would you say that?’

  ‘I take only one client per night and make few exceptions to this rule. Alexander Easy was one. The quality of my services would suffer from too much a…um…productivity.’

  ‘I can imagine,’ Sévère muttered. ‘Your right arm must hurt. The other thing that’s surprising is the fact that you seem to sharply analyse your options. Almost like a man.’

  She huffed. ‘Please, Sévère! This discussion is ridiculous. You seem to be reading that idiot Darwin.’

  His eyebrows shot up. ‘Darwin? You read Darwin? Consider me utterly dumbfounded.’

  ‘I can certainly do you the favour. However, I do know that you are waiting to sink in the knife. It is your style. You try to surprise me, to tip my balance by saying things like “you are more intelligent than I had supposed” or “I’m so utterly surprised by how much you think like a man.” You want me to grow unsuspecting, to lower my defences. You will not succeed. So say what you have to say now. Without playing a game.’

  The amused smile left his lips. ‘You are a liar.’ His face was once again a remote mask. He curled his fingers around the head of his cane. ‘I will have to visit your establishment soon.’

  ‘Why would you say that?’

  ‘Alexander Easy was fully dressed when he was found floating in the river. If, as you stated, he was taken from your room while you only shortly left it, I wonder who put his clothes on so swiftly. Bobbie couldn’t have done it all alone, and certainly not out on the streets or on a bridge before he tossed the corpse into the Thames. The madam could have helped him, perhaps. But again, you pretend not to have seen or heard anything of this. You pretend you had nothing to do with the transport and disposal of the corpse, other than not reporting it. You lie.’

  Mary frowned, her gaze unfocused, her thoughts drifting. ‘When I returned to my room, the sheets were gone. But that is normal. Rose takes care of those things. She’s very good at that. She delivered fresh sheets a few moments later, as usual…’ Mary cocked her head. ‘Later than usual. But she cannot have…’

  ‘What can she not have?’

  ‘It’s impossible. She’s only eight. I doubt the madam helped. She doesn’t dirty her own hands. Rose can’t have dressed the corpse, even if Bobbie had held it for her. The limbs were too heavy.’

  ‘And how would you know this?’

  She regarded him sharply. ‘Because I’m a whore. Men do occasionally lose consciousness on top of me.’

  Sévère nodded once. ‘Go on.’

  ‘I don’t know how many people are required to dress a corpse so quickly, but they couldn’t have dressed him in the parlour. The risk of a client seeing it is too high. That leaves the kitchen and the basement. But I would have heard them going down the stairs. Bobbie’s footfalls are heavy, they would have been even heavier had he carried Mr Easy.’

  She stared out the window, watching houses and trees rush by. Suddenly, she clapped her hand to her mouth. ‘Could they’ve hidden him under my bed and taken him away after I left my r
oom in the morning?’

  ‘No. His blood was not coagulated at the time of the autopsy. Dr Johnston concluded that he’d been immersed in cold water around the time of his death.’ He narrowed his eyes at her.

  ‘Oh, right.’ she said. ‘Did the inspector find out if Easy was a bleeder?’

  ‘They thought it unnecessary to find and question Easy’s physician, because the death was deemed natural.’

  ‘So the police lost interest in the case? And you have no jurisdiction. How lovely.’ She clapped her hands together, looking very satisfied with herself. ‘Sévère, if you must, you may visit me once more. But I’ve told you the truth. You know everything I know about my night with Alexander Easy.’

  ‘If you say so.’ He turned to gaze out the window.

  She watched him for a long moment, knowing he didn’t believe her, then joined his silent appraisal of the landscape.

  ‘Didn’t you forget something?’ she asked.

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘You didn’t tell me what you learnt at the police station.’

  ‘You believe I planned to share this information with you but simply…forgot to do it?’

  ‘I had hoped so.’

  He waved a hand in dismissal. ‘Redhill is a place of peace and harmony. Or so it appears. No rapes have been reported in the past ten years. Two cases of concealment of birth, both of which might or might not have been infanticides. I’ll look into these further. No cases of murder or manslaughter, no cases of death by neglect. No one who could be suspected of baby farming. Three cases of adultery, all of which were resolved in a civilised manner.’

  ‘Meaning no man lost his parts?’

  ‘Meaning the accused pleaded guilty.’

  ‘How boring.’

  The train rolled into Victoria Station and screeched to a halt. Mary bent close to Sévère’s face, and whispered, ‘This was a most enjoyable day. Thank you. But I have a confession to make: You are the first man who’s received a thorough lashing from me, and I did not enjoy it as much as I probably should have. Better ask someone else next time you need your backside stroked.’