by Alex Grecian
She smoothed her dress and led the way back into the pub.
52
We’ve come to see Inspector Little.”
Sergeant Kett looked up at the couple standing in the door of the back hall. The man had his hat in his hands and the woman had clearly put on her Sunday best to come round to the Yard on a Wednesday afternoon.
“Inspector Little’s unavailable,” Kett said. “What’s this regarding?”
“Our son,” the man said. He stepped forward just a bit, half a step. “Inspector Little was trying to find our missing son. We just wanted to know…”
The man broke off and smiled, but there was no warmth in it. That smile was the last vestige of hope on an otherwise thoroughly disappointed face.
“He’s our only boy,” the woman said.
“We got three girls,” the man said. “Only the one boy. We been waitin’ to hear, like the detective said to, but we need some news, sir. It’s got us torn up.”
“Inspector Little was moved to the Murder Squad not long ago,” Kett said. “That might be why you never heard nothin’.”
With so many missing in London every year, there was virtually no chance their son would be found. They hadn’t received news because the overworked detectives rarely had any news to report in cases like theirs.
“Murder squad? Is our boy murdered?”
“Nothin’ to do with your boy.”
“Who do we talk to, then?” the woman said.
“I’ll take you back there.”
Kett rose and came around the desk. He gestured for the couple to follow and led them down the short corridor. Off to his left, at the end of the hall, the Murder Squad room was mostly empty. Oliver Boring sat munching on a biscuit and reading a file, but the place was otherwise empty, everybody away looking for Little’s killer. Kett pointed at the bustling hive of detectives in the bigger room to his right.
“You’ll be wantin’ one of them,” he said.
“But…” the man said. “But who?”
Kett led them to Inspector Gerard’s desk. Gerard was one of the better detectives who hadn’t been tapped for the Murder Squad. Kett made introductions all around.
“You’ll need to ask Inspector Day for the file,” Kett said. “He’s got all of Mr Little’s things.”
“Why’s that?” the father of the missing boy said.
“We’re reshuffling a bit,” Kett said.
If they hadn’t read the papers and didn’t know that Little was gone, Kett saw no reason to alarm them. Learning that the detective was dead might kill their spirits. And their spirits were all they had.
He left them with Gerard, who had taken a pen and was writing down information about their boy. The only word Kett heard was Fenn, but he didn’t know if that was a name or a marsh where the boy had disappeared. He shook his head and returned to his desk just inside the door of the Yard.
53
That’s him there.”
The bartender pointed to a short man who was just now drawing one of two chairs up to a low table in the corner of the room near the fireplace. Hammersmith thanked the bartender and followed Blackleg to the man’s table.
“You’d be Sam Pizer?” Blackleg said.
The man drew a blunt used cigar from his shirt pocket before looking up at them.
“And who’d you be, then?” he said.
“Never mind who we are.”
“Well, I can guess at your game. And that one’s a bluebottle.” He pointed at Hammersmith. “I’ve no business with either of you.”
“Could be we’ve got business with you.”
Blackleg pulled up the other chair for himself and left Hammersmith to find his own chair, which he did by dragging one over from a nearby table.
“What’ya want, then?” Pizer said. He chewed on the end of his stubby cigar.
“Where were you three days ago?” Hammersmith said.
“Who knows? Where were you?”
“I suggest you treat this seriously.”
“Why? You gonna arrest me? For what?”
“Where’s your climber?”
“My what?”
“You know very well. The boy you employ to climb chimneys. Where is he?”
Pizer made a show of looking around the room. “Don’t look like he’s out for a drink.”
He laughed and fished a small metal device from his pocket. It looked like a miniature pair of scissors. One end resembled a pair of tongs. There was a rivet in the center. At the opposite end from the tongs were two crescent-moon-shaped cutters. Pizer snipped the end off the old cigar with the sharp end and turned the device around. He gripped the short cigar with the tong end and held it to his lips. Blackleg produced a match, struck it, and held it to the end of the cigar. Pizer leaned forward and puffed until the cigar was lit. He leaned back. “Thanks.”
Hammersmith pointed at the device. “Had that long?”
“Got it off a sailor. Handy little cigar cutter, ain’t it?”
Hammersmith jumped from his chair. His hand shot out like a snake and grabbed Pizer’s arm. Pizer dropped the cigar and the cutter clattered on the table. Hammersmith snatched it up with his free hand.
“I’ve seen this shape.”
He held the crescent blades under Pizer’s nose. The chimney sweep looked at him, his eyes wide, a crumb of tobacco stuck to his bottom lip.
“You branded that boy with these, didn’t you? There was a scar on his arm this exact shape and size. You heated it up in the fire and you burned it into his skin.”
Pizer shook his head. He pulled away from Hammersmith and pushed his chair back. Standing, he was a full head shorter than Hammersmith.
“Don’t know whatcher talkin about, bluebottle.”
“You left that child to die in the chimney. You walked away and left him.”
“Did no such thing.” Pizer’s eyes narrowed. “And if I did, you got no proof of it. Nothin’ you can do to me, bluebottle, so why don’t you go aboutcher business?”
He straightened his shirt, pulling it back down over his ample belly.
“You’re under arrest,” Hammersmith said.
He clasped Pizer’s wrist. Blackleg cleared his throat and Hammersmith looked over at him. The older man shook his head.
“You can’t,” he said.
“No, you can’t,” Pizer said.
Hammersmith let go of Pizer’s wrist and took a step back. The two criminals were right. They knew the law and they knew its limits. Pizer had done nothing illegal and nothing provable.
Pizer picked his cigar up off the table, brushed it off, and stuck the wet end back in his mouth. He grabbed his cigar cutter and grinned.
“Tell ya what. You seemed to like this well enough. You have it. A gift from yer old friend Sam. So you don’t forget me.”
He took Hammersmith’s hand, pressed the cutter into his palm, and closed Hammersmith’s fingers around it. He winked and walked away. The door of the pub slammed shut behind him.
Hammersmith threw the cutter into the fireplace and turned on Blackleg. “You didn’t help.”
“What should I have done, bluebottle?”
“I don’t know, but…”
“The law can’t touch someone like that. He’ll eventually end up dead, and it won’t be pretty, but it won’t be the law what does him in.”
Hammersmith pulled up Pizer’s chair and sat down hard. The poison was still working on him, although it seemed to be slowly dissipating. He felt tired and frustrated and the adrenaline rush of anger was fading. He looked around at the other people in the pub, the bartender, the waitress, four other men deep in their drinks. Nobody was paying attention, nobody cared that the chimney sweep had escaped justice.
“He can’t just walk away like this. There must be something someone can do.”
“Oh, there is,” Blackleg said. “But you needed to see that he’s outside yer reach, Mr Hammersmith.”
“What are you implying?”
“You can’t do
anything to him, but that don’t mean he can’t be touched, do it?”
“You mean you can do something, even if I can’t?”
“I didn’t say that exactly.”
“What would you do?”
“I would do what needs doing.”
“I can’t condone that.”
“Didn’t say you needed to.”
“What if I stopped you?”
Blackleg chuckled. “Shame you threw that cutter in the fire. It was a nice one. You coulda give it to me, if you didn’t want it fer yerself.”
“I want to be the one who brings him to justice, Blackleg.”
“You can’t.”
“I know.”
“Best you can do is know it was done without knowin’ how. ’Cause yer still the law and that scum ain’t worth losin’ yer job and yer freedom.”
“I want more than that.”
“Thought you might feel that way. Could be there’s one way you can be a part of what needs to happen.”
“How?”
“Be a part without bein’ involved, I mean.”
“How?”
“Hire ’im. Give ’im a chimney to clean. I don’t got a chimney, but you do.”
“How did you know that?”
Blackleg smiled, but didn’t answer.
“My chimney’s small,” Hammersmith said.
“Size don’t matter. He won’t get a chance to actually clean it.”
“But if he knows it’s small to begin with, he’ll press some other child into service to bring with him. We don’t want that.”
“Well, we don’t need to tell ’im it’s small, do we?”
“And when he comes, we’ll be on hand. I can have my flatmate there, too. He’ll help.”
“What then? He’ll laugh in yer face again. No, you don’t need to be about and neither do any other bluebottles.”
They stared at each other for a long moment.
“Can you live with not knowin’, but knowin’ anyways, Mr Hammersmith?”
“I don’t know.”
“I s’pose you’ll find out soon enough.”
“Why?” Hammersmith said. “Why do you care enough about the death of a child to involve yourself in this?”
“You said it yerself: It’s the death of a child. Someone’s gotta care. Hell, we should all care.”
“Use my flat.”
“I thought I would.”
“But how do I hire him? Put an advertisement in the Times?”
“I’ve already taken the liberty,” Blackleg said. “The notice is runnin’ in the morning’s edition.”
54
When Hammersmith left the pub, he kept a hand on the outside wall and concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other. He walked carefully toward a taxi stand and never looked behind him. If he had, he might have seen Charles Shaw leave his shadowy post beside the pub’s front door.
Shaw trailed Hammersmith down the street and hovered near the stand until Hammersmith had boarded an omnibus. Hammersmith made his way to the back of the bus and Shaw jumped on, heading for the top deck, where he’d be able to see Hammersmith disembark.
Like Hammersmith, Shaw never looked behind him, and so he didn’t see the two women who were already following Hammersmith at a discreet distance. Shaw was climbing the ladder to the top of the bus when the prostitutes paid their ha’pennies and found seats near the front, behind the horses.
When everyone was safely aboard, the driver shook the reins and the bus rumbled off in the eventual direction of Hammersmith’s flat.
55
S he answered the door herself and so he assumed that she was the housekeeper. She was very young and very pretty, but she had a haggard air about her, as if she had been worked to the bone by a harsh mistress.
“Is the lady of the house in?” he said.
“I am the lady of the house, sir.”
“Oh, my. I do apologize.”
“No need to apologize. The housekeeper has left for the day or your question would make perfect sense.”
“Were you the housekeeper I should worry about the state of your mistress’s marriage. Her husband would no doubt be unable to take his eyes off you and she would discharge you within a fortnight.”
“How charming. Thank you, I think.”
“I apologize again. I’ve reached too far for a compliment and embarrassed you instead.”
Cinderhouse took her hand and kissed it.
“My name is Bentley,” he said. “Inspector Richard Bentley. I’m an associate of your husband’s. We work closely together at the Yard.”
Her eyes grew wider and her smile disappeared. “Is Walter all right?”
“Oh, of course. Of course he is. I didn’t mean to alarm you. I continue to start on the wrong foot here. May I come in?”
“Please do. I shouldn’t leave you out on the stoop. I’m so unused to receiving visitors, you see.”
She stood aside and allowed him into the house. It was small, but well appointed and tidy. He took off his hat and gloves and handed them to her, but kept his coat on.
“I won’t be staying. I just had a question or two.”
“I’m afraid my husband isn’t home.”
“That’s just as well. It’s you I want to talk to.”
They were interrupted by the sound of a whistling kettle.
“I was just preparing tea,” she said. “Would you join me?”
“I’d be delighted, Mrs Day.”
“Please, call me Claire.”
She smiled and hurried away through a door on the other side of the room. He got a glimpse of a tidy kitchen before the door swung shut again, leaving him alone in the front room. The parlor was cozy: a faded Oriental rug over polished floorboards, bright florals on the walls, a fire on the hearth with a red-striped Renaissance Revival chair pulled up in front of it. The lady’s sewing basket was open beside it and a white shirt was draped over one arm of the chair. Claire Day was obviously mending her husband’s shirt. From where he stood, Cinderhouse could already see problems with the repair job.
He edged closer and peered into the basket. A pair of red-handled shears sat atop a jumble of thread spools and a card of needles. A small jar of buttons had tipped over inside the basket, spilling its wood and ivory contents. He picked up the shears and hefted them.
They were good shears.
He realized that Claire had been silent for some time. He pushed through the kitchen door, still carrying the shears. She was across the small room, cutting bread into small triangles. Cinderhouse stepped silently up behind her. Finger sandwiches and pastries had been laid out on a silver tray, part of a matching tea service with a pot and two cups, sugar tongs, and a creamer.
Claire turned and nearly bumped into him.
“Oh!”
“I apologize,” he said. “I didn’t mean to startle you. I thought you might want some help.”
“Thank you. Would you mind carrying the tray?”
“Not at all.”
He put the shears down on the counter and picked up the tray, carried it out of the kitchen, and set it on the small oak table in the corner of the parlor.
“You needn’t have gone to any trouble for me, Mrs Day.”
“I asked you to call me Claire. And it’s no trouble at all. I’m glad of the company.”
“Well then, I’m happy I stopped in.”
He pulled a chair out for her and she sat. He took the chair across from her and she poured for them both.
“Milk?”
“Lemon, please.”
He waited for her to take a sandwich and then he took one himself and bit into it. He controlled the impulse to spit it back out. He wondered how anyone could cock up a cucumber sandwich, but he smiled and swallowed and took another tiny bite of the tiny sandwich.
“Delicious,” he said.
“Thank you, but I think you’re being kind. It’s awful, isn’t it?”
“Not at all.”
“You’re
a gentleman.”
She set down her sandwich and folded her hands in front of her on the table.
“Tell me,” she said, “what did you want to ask?”
“Pardon?”
“You said you had a question for me and I’m on tenterhooks to hear what it could possibly be.”
“Ah, that. Yes, well, your husband, Inspector Day, has been sent out suddenly on a new assignment and I’m to take over the case he was working. Only…”
“What is it?”
“I hate to speak ill of him in his own home, but his notes are a shambles. I have no idea where he’s gone and I’m at my wits’ end. I wondered if he might have told you anything about his investigation.”
“Oh, I doubt it very much. He rarely talks about his work.”
“This particular case is rather sensational. A detective was murdered and your husband was tracking the killer. I wonder if he mentioned any suspects to you? Anyone he might be focusing on?”
“A detective was killed?”
“You didn’t know?”
“How concerned should I be about my husband, Mr Bentley? Is he in danger?”
“I’m not sure.”
“You mean there might be more murders?”
“It’s a possibility. I’m being perfectly frank with you, Mrs Day. I’d hoped that you might shed some light on things for me. I have no idea which way to turn. I’m afraid more murders are a very real possibility.”
“Oh, I wish he had told me something. Now I shall go mad with worry until the killer is arrested.”
“I shouldn’t have been so forthright with you. I apologize.”
“No, don’t be sorry. I’m glad you told me. I do so hate being kept in the dark. I just wish there were something I could do to help.”
“Perhaps there is something.”
“Yes, anything.”
“If you could persuade your husband to abandon the case…”
“But I thought he was already working on another case.”
“He is. But that’s only temporary. He’ll be back on this one as soon as he’s finished.”
“Unless you solve it, you mean.”
“Yes, but it seems hopeless. The thing is, I have every reason to believe that the murderer won’t kill again if he’s left alone.”
