by Alex Grecian
Jack held her like a father might hold a bawling infant, and he spoke a single word. Through his beard, his mouth smelled of metal and fish and old rope.
“Slowly,” he said.
And then there were other voices, the voices of women, far away at the alley’s mouth. She felt herself fall to the stones as Jack disappeared. There came the sound of boot heels on cobblestones, and then she felt soft hands on her skin and she heard a soft voice in her ear.
“Don’t die,” someone said.
And so she didn’t die.
Instead, she slept.
Liza woke again for the third time in a night and gasped at her false memory of Esme’s ordeal. She watched the ceiling of the tiny rented room they shared, and when that proved unsatisfying, she rolled onto her elbow and went back to watching Esme.
And Esme whimpered in her sleep.
18
T he bald man woke with a start. He lay listening to the dark house and the rain beating against the roof above, unable to pinpoint what had awakened him. He fumbled along the bedside table for his spectacles and put them on, then went searching for the box of matches he kept next to the candlestick. He was a firm believer in the old ways of doing things, and a candle would do just fine. There was no electricity in his house. He felt strongly that mankind had grown too arrogant and had harnessed an elemental force that would eventually turn on its master. He waited nervously for all of London to burn to the ground, done in by the fiery electrical wires strung here and there over the city.
He struck a match and contemplated the sudden blue flame for a moment before lighting the tallow candle and snuffing the match between his fingers. He felt a sudden cramping in his bowels and, jamming his feet into the slippers on the floor beside his bed, he hurried out of the room and down the hall to the water closet. Not all of the new ways of doing things were bad. Indoor plumbing, for instance, was marvelous.
When he had finished, he pulled the chain to flush and took his candle back out to the hall. The house was old, and the floor creaked under his weight. He walked against the wall where it was quieter and eased open the boy’s door.
At first he didn’t see anything amiss. The candle’s glow didn’t penetrate far into the room. He crept closer, just wanting a look at the boy before heading back to his own bedroom. He had given Fenn a room of his own after they’d returned from the park. The bald man had been proud of the boy for obeying him in public. There had been no shouts for help or attempts to run away. The bald man was sure that Fenn was beginning to think of him as his natural father and to think of this house as his own. Of course, the bald man wasn’t stupid. He had still tied the boy to his bed.
The flickering candlelight played over the boy’s bed, chasing shadows into the folds and curves of the blankets. Too many folds and curves. The bald man approached the bed. He swallowed hard and reached out, grabbed a corner of the topmost blanket and yanked too hard. The blanket flew at his face and he almost dropped the candlestick. He let the blanket fall to the floor and pulled at the other blankets. The ropes he had used to tie the boy were tangled at the foot of the bed.
Fenn was gone.
Panicked, the bald man rushed to his own room and pulled a pair of trousers on under his nightshirt. He used a snuffer to put out the candle and hurried into the hall and down the creaking stairs to the front door.
How had the boy made it down the stairs without the sound of those dry old boards awakening the bald man?
He cursed himself for a trusting fool. He hadn’t double-checked the ropes before going to bed, hadn’t taken out the slack. He had been too kind. Of course the boy wasn’t ready yet to accept his new family situation. It would take more time. The bald man had rushed things, trying to recapture his past. He hesitated, trying to remember his first son’s name, but it wouldn’t come to him. He shook off the sudden twinge of sadness and regret. It hardly mattered now.
Outside, the rain fell steady, but not hard. The bald man left the front door open and went to the middle of the street. He looked both ways, trying to decide where the boy might have gone. The rain beaded on his head and ran in rivulets down the back of his neck. Within minutes, the thin fabric of his nightshirt clung to his skin and his slippers had absorbed enough water to triple their weight.
He hunched his shoulders and shut his eyes, trying to imagine himself as a young boy in a strange neighborhood. He opened his eyes again and looked around. Rain clouds blotted out the moon. A carriage swept by, a gas lamp swinging back and forth from the pole next to the driver. The bald man’s gaze followed the carriage down the street and watched as it turned onto a broader lane where firefly clusters of streetlamps struggled to penetrate the gloom. The bald man’s street was completely dark, no lamps here, and the streets to the east were also residential, but to the west were more thoroughly traveled streets, and those were lit up with gas. He felt sure the boy would have been drawn to the light, dim as it was.
The bald man set himself on a westerly course and followed in the wake of the carriage.
19
Kingsley stared into the dying embers of the night’s fire, not focused on the coals or his surroundings. Outside, rain pattered against the roof. A small noise in the room woke him from his daze, and he slowly shook off his malaise and turned his head. Fiona was standing in the doorway watching him.
“How long have you been there?” he said.
“Not long. Do you feel all right, Father?”
He smiled and nodded. “Of course I do. Why aren’t you asleep, Plum?”
“I heard a noise. A carriage going by outside.”
Kingsley sniffed and glanced up at the clock on the mantel above the dead fire.
“It’s early yet. Or late. You should try to sleep a bit more.”
“I’m awake. Should I get you something? Tea?”
“No, thank you.”
“Have you slept yet?”
“You know, I don’t think I have,” Kingsley said.
Fiona padded across the room and sat on the arm of the chair. Kingsley put his hand on her back. He wiped his other hand across his face and tried to remember what he’d been thinking of. Fiona spoke as if she could read his thoughts.
“Were you thinking of Mother?”
“I don’t know. Maybe I was.”
“I was thinking of her even before the carriage woke me.”
“You were dreaming, you mean.”
“Yes. We were all together at Hyde Park, gathered around the fountain. You know the one I mean, with the statue of the angel in it.”
“I think I know the one, but I’m not sure that statue’s meant to be an angel.”
“I think it is.”
“Fair enough.”
“You and Mother were holding hands, and Beatrice was there, too, home from school, I think.”
“We should visit her soon.”
“I’d like that.”
“Then we’ll do it.”
“Do you still dream about her?”
“Beatrice?”
He knew what she meant. She wasn’t talking about her sister.
“Mother.”
“Yes, Plum, I still dream about her. I suppose we always will.”
“Do you think she dreams of us?”
“No.”
“Not ever?”
“She doesn’t dream anymore.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because I have seen countless dead people, I have cut into them and removed their organs and weighed their brains, and not one of the dead has ever told me anything that wasn’t concrete and physical. When people die, their minds no longer work. They can’t dream.”
“What about their souls?”
“I have never seen a soul nor found a repository for such a thing in any body I’ve examined. There is no soul.”
Fiona was quiet, and Kingsley realized he’d upset his daughter. He was too tired to be of any use to his still-grieving daughter. He rubbed his hand clumsily up and down he
r back. He wished he could offer her some comfort, some assurance that her mother lived on, but since he didn’t believe it himself, he had no way of convincing her. She wiped her eyes, but her hair had fallen over her face and Kingsley couldn’t see her.
“Well, I believe we all have souls,” she said, “and you just can’t see them.”
Kingsley nodded. He was afraid to contradict her.
“I believe my mother is in heaven and I will see her again someday.”
Kingsley smiled, but it was a sad smile. “I sincerely hope that day is a long way off,” he said.
“I mean that we’ll see her when we both die of old age, hundreds and hundreds of years from now.”
“It’s a pleasant thought, at least.”
“Maybe she’s looking at us right now. Maybe she’s smiling at us and making nice things happen for us.”
“That would be an excellent dream for you to have.”
“It would, wouldn’t it?”
They sat in companionable silence, staring at the embers in the fireplace, and eventually Fiona slid off the arm of the chair and into her father’s lap. He smoothed her hair away from her face and she shifted slightly, mumbled something unheard, and began to snore quietly.
Kingsley sat in the dark and watched the crackling remains of the fire until he fell asleep.
He didn’t dream about anything at all.
20
Walter Day laid his head on his wife’s pillow and closed his eyes. Beside him, Claire swept a lock of hair from her eyes and propped herself on one elbow, her other hand on her husband’s chest.
“Let me lie here a moment and I’ll return to my room,” Day said. “I should have stayed there. You need your sleep.”
“But your room is miles away from mine,” Claire said.
“Only down the hall.”
“That’s still too far. And I sleep too much as it is. I hardly see you anymore.”
“It’s this case.”
“I know that. I’m not complaining. What is the case, Walter?”
“I shouldn’t say.”
“But I would love to hear about it.”
“It might upset you.”
“I’m no flower, you know.”
Day sighed. “I heard Percy Erwood still hasn’t married,” he said.
“Are you changing the subject, Mr Day?”
“You must have been the only woman for him.”
“I was never for him.”
She took her hand off Walter’s chest and moved away, staring in the dark direction of the ceiling.
“Why did you ever marry me and leave poor Percy in the lurch?” Day said.
“I declare,” she said. “You’re not going to worry about Percy Erwood for the rest of our long lives, are you?”
“I wouldn’t say I’m worried about him.”
“If you had your way, Percy Erwood would come here right now and carry me away.”
“Right now?”
“In the morning, then.”
“I would rather he didn’t.”
“As would I.”
Day smacked his lips and mumbled something Claire couldn’t make out.
“What’s that, dear?” she said.
“I said that I still remember the moment I fell in love with you.”
“Was I there or was it just you and Percy Erwood deciding amongst yourselves who ought to win me?”
“It was in church. That’s the only place I ever saw you. No, that’s not true. I saw you often when we were small, passing in the street sometimes, playing with your friends, and once in the post office, but church was the only place I felt like we might be on equal ground.”
“And you remember a single Sunday?”
“You were wearing a yellow dress. And a bonnet.”
“You remember the color of the dress?”
“And you wore gloves that nearly reached your elbows.”
“And you liked me?”
“You were the best and prettiest girl I had ever seen, and I knew you would never marry me because I wasn’t good enough.”
Claire smiled, though she knew Walter couldn’t see her. “I prefer to decide that sort of thing for myself.”
“And so,” Day said as though he hadn’t heard her, “I knew it was a hopeless cause, but I tried every day to be the best person I could be, to be good enough for you, whether you noticed or not.”
“You were always good enough, Walter Day,” she said. But she wasn’t sure whether she’d spoken loud enough for him to hear.
They lay there side by side for a long time then, Claire straining to see the ceiling. She thought her eyes would eventually adjust to the darkness, but they didn’t. Before long, Walter began to snore, and Claire curled up with her back along his side. She knew he would be gone from her bedroom by the time she woke in the morning.
“I married you,” she said, “because you’re the sort of man who remembers my yellow dress.”
She closed her eyes and waited for sleep to come.
“Humph,” she said. “Percy Erwood, indeed.”
21
Constable Nevil Hammersmith paused with his hand on the knob and took a deep breath before opening the door and entering the Brass Tankard. It was the seventh pub he’d visited since parting ways with Pringle and they were getting more squalid as the hour grew late. The only pubs still open were the places that catered to serious drinkers and criminals. Unless he found what he was looking for soon, he feared he would get no sleep before his shift.
He still had a long night ahead of him.
DAY TWO
22
SEVENTEEN HOURS SINCE THE DISCOVERY OF MR LITTLE.
The sun climbed over the rooftops of Kentish Town, glancing through rain clouds and in at windows as it rose. Claire Day stood in front of her mirror, but she didn’t watch herself. She had enough experience that her fingers remembered what to do now; she didn’t need to see them.
She pulled the corset over her head and tugged it into place above her hips. She tightened the top set of laces below her shoulder blades and moved down, rung by rung, until she reached the middle of her back, where two loops hung down. She grabbed them and pulled the top half of the corset tight, whalebone biting into her sternum.
She took a shallow breath and started again at the bottom of the corset, just below her waist. Again, each set of laces was yanked taut until once more she reached the middle of her back. The loops, longer now, were crossed over each other and stretched again until they were long enough to wrap around to the front of Claire’s waist. She pulled as hard as she could and tied the ends into a discreet bow over her navel.
She looked down at her handiwork, what she could see of it, and frowned. Her maidservant had always made a prettier bow. Claire had resolved herself to the fact that she would never have a staff like the household she’d grown up in. Her husband was the loveliest man she’d ever met, and money meant nothing to him. They had little enough of it, but Walter routinely gave it away to anyone he met who appeared to be needy. Claire had no regrets.
She backed up and sat carefully on the edge of the bed, still avoiding her reflection in the mirror above the vanity.
She panted like a small dog, shallow breaths in and out. The inevitable suggestion of a deep breath presented itself to her and she tried to ignore it, but the thought grew until she felt she had to yawn.
Of course, she couldn’t yawn.
Instead, she felt her stomach turn over on itself, cramped though it was down there, and she ran to the bathroom, barely making it to the basin against the far wall before her gorge rose and she vomited water. It splashed her chin and dribbled from her nose. Thankfully, there was nothing else in her system, but still she continued to heave.
Finally, her body calmed itself and she slid to the floor, her eyes closed, her breathing slow and steady.
She sat there until the light of the dawning sun filtered through the curtains and turned the insides of her eyelids orange. Then she grabb
ed the edge of the basin and stood.
Claire wiped her face and rinsed out her mouth. She pulled a long lacy gown on over the corset and left the bathroom. Her husband’s room was just down the short hallway, and she could hear water splashing in a basin, Walter getting ready for the day. She hurried her steps. He would need a freshly pressed shirt for work.
Her stomach turned again and she pushed against the wall until the sensation passed. She closed her eyes, took a short breath, and when she opened her husband’s bedroom door she was composed and smiling.
There was no need to trouble him.
The bald man returned to his house when the street vendors started setting up their stalls for the day. Traffic had begun to pick up, curious passersby glancing in his direction, and the bald man realized that he was still wearing his sopping nightshirt and slippers.
He bathed quickly and changed clothes.
In Fenn’s room, the bald man examined the ropes that had held the boy to his bed. They were still intact, still knotted. Fenn must have spent hours wriggling his way out of them. The bars on the window looked sturdy, but when the bald man checked them, one bar slid out of place. It swung to the side and the bald man stooped to look at the window casing. The mortar there was crumbled and loose. When he scraped at it with a fingernail, it sifted down the wall like sand. He moved the bed and there was a pile of grit on the floor. Clearly he had done a shoddy job installing the bars, hadn’t mixed the mortar well enough and left a dry pocket that the boy had been able to scratch away at, loosening a single bar just enough to squeeze through.
Below the window, a flood wall ran the length of the block. Fenn could easily have hopped down to the top of it, then over and away.
