The Tea Rose

by Jennifer Donnelly

  “Come on, Liz, put it down. You don’t want the kind of trouble you’ll get if you cut her.”

  Lizzie looked up at him. Her face was twisted by anger, but her eyes were brimming with tears. “But I saw ’im first, guv,” she said. “ ’E was my punter! Went to the loo and when I got back she was ’alfway out the door with ’im!”

  Roddy took a few steps toward her. “Give me the bottle, luv.”

  “I’ve been sleeping rough for a week!” she cried. “I just want a bed for the night, that’s all.” Her gaze fell upon Maggie again. “And I ’ad it, too! Till she thieved me customer!”

  “Let her up. Sleeping rough’s still better than the nick.”

  Lizzie laughed mirthlessly. “You’re wrong there, guv. At least you get a bowl of skilly in the nick. At least it’s warm.”

  Roddy was squatting beside Lizzie now. He reached out for the bottle. “Come on, now,” he coaxed. “We’re all t’rough carrying on.” She handed it over. He helped her up, then Maggie, eyeing their worn skirts and grimy hands as he did. Lizzie’s own cheek was horribly scarred, torn in some long-ago fight. Maggie’s wrists, sticking out past the cuffs of her threadbare purple jacket, were nothing but skin over bone.

  Roddy was well aware that he should arrest them for being drunk and disorderly, but he wouldn’t. They weren’t criminals, these women, they were just desperate. Desperate and hungry and spent. He told them what mission would allow them a bowl of soup without making them choke down too much religion with it and warned them that he wouldn’t be so lenient the next time. Then he advised the half dozen onlookers who had gathered to be on their way and resumed his walk, heading east toward Christ Church.

  As a sergeant, Roddy was no longer required to patrol the streets, but it was a long-standing habit with him, one he indulged in nightly for an hour or so on his way home to his family and his two-story row house in safe, respectable Bow. It kept him in contact with the people he was paid to protect. It also let the bad element know that he was out there on their turf, watching them.

  “Evening, sir,” came a voice from the gloom.

  Roddy squinted into the fog and saw a squat, bulky figure approaching – helmeted, a row of brass buttons on his blue jacket. He smiled. It was McPherson. Twenty-five years on the force and still walking the streets. Not because he wasn’t good enough to move up. He was one of the smartest, toughest officers Roddy had ever known and he’d been offered advancement many times, but he’d always turned it down. The man wanted nothing to do with the headaches and frustrations of rank.

  “Quiet night, Constable?” he asked.

  “For the most part. Yourself?”

  “Stopped one lass tearing off another’s face,” Roddy said nonchalantly.

  “That so?”

  “Aye.”

  McPherson laughed. “You’re a rum one, Sergeant. Most of the brass can’t wait to get off the streets, you can’t wait to get back on ’em. ’Eaded ’ome, are you?”

  “Aye. T’ought I’d walk a bit first. See what I can see.”

  “I just saw something interesting meself.”

  “Oh, aye?”

  “Sid Malone and Denny Quinn. Coming out of the Taj.”

  Roddy frowned. “Malone? The bloke from Lambeth?”

  “The very one.”

  “Whitechapel’s pretty far afield for him. Wonder what he’s up to?”

  “No good, I’m sure.”

  “What’s he look like?”

  McPherson shrugged. “Like every other criminal in London. Big. Tough. Just as soon kill you as look at you. You’ve never seen ’im?”

  “If I did, it was some years ago.” Roddy remembered that Charlie Finnegan had worked with a lad called Sid Malone at the brewery, and that this lad had tried to manhandle Fiona. He had paid him a call shortly thereafter, advising him never to trouble her again. The Sid Malone he remembered had been a bully, and bullies picked fights with people weaker than themselves. The Sid Malone who had visited the Taj was picking a fight with someone stronger. A lot stronger.

  “I ’ear ’e’s very busy on the south bank,” McPherson said. “Maybe ’e’s thinking of setting up shop in our neighbor’ood.”

  “Could be. Keep your ear to the ground.”

  “I will. You heading north, Sergeant? Go take a gander at the tea factory. Fire nearly burned the whole street down. Forty-odd families ’omeless. Official word is a dosser was in there smoking. Fell asleep and set the place alight.”

  Roddy spat. A bad taste had crept into his mouth. “Unofficial word is Bowler Sheehan. Sure, we’ll never pin it on him. It’s all ‘Hear no evil, see no evil.’ As usual.”

  “Sheehan’s a firebug now?”

  “He does the odd job for the man who owns the place. William Burton. Estate agent I talked to says Burton’s had the building on the market for years. My guess is he hired Sheehan to help him collect a big fat insurance check.”

  “Well, ’e picked a good night for a fire. Nice and dry. Not like tonight.” He rubbed his hands together. “This is Ripper weather.”

  “Aye, it is. Don’t talk about him much anymore. He’s a forbidden topic in my home.”

  “Mine, too.”

  It was a forbidden topic in the homes of all the officers who had worked on the case. Wives had heard the stories over and over again and were tired of their husbands’ obsession with a madman.

  “It’s over with, Roddy. It’s done!” Grace had shouted at him shortly after they were married, after he’d thrashed himself awake from yet another nightmare. “They found that body in the Thames and everyone says it was Jack. Nothing you can do will bring those women back. Or Kate Finnegan. For God’s sake, why can’t you let it go?”

  Why indeed? He wanted to. He didn’t want to see Annie Chapman’s dead eyes in his nightmares. He didn’t want to wake up with the scent of blood in his nostrils. He didn’t want to hear Fiona’s sobs as they lowered her poor murdered mother into the ground. He wished he could just believe what he was supposed to – that Montague Druitt, the young barrister whose body police had pulled from the Thames in ’88, was the murderer.

  As if reading his thoughts, McPherson said, “It’s a load of tripe, the Yard saying Druitt was the Ripper. I never believed it.”

  Roddy gave him a long look. “Nor I. Not’ing fits. The poor lad was as mad as a hatter, but he wasn’t a murderer. No history of violence. And he didn’t know Whitechapel.”

  “Not like Jack knew Whitechapel.”

  “Or still does,” Roddy said softly.

  It was a thought both men shared, but rarely voiced – the idea that Jack was still out there somewhere. Biding his time. Each had seen a body or two over the years – streetwalkers who’d been strangled or stabbed – and each had wondered if it was Jack’s work. Had he learned to control his compulsions? Indulging them less frequently? Had he learned to vary his method? The top brass did its best to keep these deaths quiet. The case was closed, they said. The Ripper was dead.

  “Should let it rest, I guess,” McPherson said. “We’ll never know for sure, will we? ’Ave to file it under unfinished business.”

  Roddy nodded. Unfinished business. That was part of the job no one had told him about. Subduing a man, what to do when you were outnumbered – these were things that could be learned. But no training could prepare you for the unsolved cases. The dead ends. The failure. As a young man, he’d refused to accept it, believing if he just worked harder, he’d solve every case. He’d find the clue, the one overlooked detail, that would help him catch the thief, the child molester, the murderer. He’d learned differently over the years. He’d learned that sometimes there were no clues. Sometimes criminals were smart. Or lucky. He’d learned, after many years, how to kiss his wife at the end of the day and put his children to bed, knowing full well that robbers prowled as he did so, women were beaten, murderers walked free. He’d had many teachers, but none better than Jack.

  “I’m off, then,” McPherson said. “Going to tak
e a stroll round Brick Lane. The scenic route. Night, Sergeant. Safe ’ome.”

  “And you, McPherson. Take care.”

  Roddy continued east. He twirled his nightstick as he walked, sunk deep in the memories of ’88. The past wasn’t gone on a night like this. It was as real as the solid cobbles under his feet, the bitter air he breathed. He consoled himself with the one good thing that had come out of all that misery – Fiona’s and Seamie’s escape from this place. Their new life in America.

  He’d just had a Christmas card from Fiona with a likeness of herself, her husband Nicholas, and Seamie enclosed. She’d grown into such a beautiful woman. But then again, she’d always been a bonny lass. And Seamie was a young man now. Handsome and tall. Roddy had been so happy to get the card. He was always happy when her letters and photographs arrived. It pleased him to think what she’d made of herself. A tea merchant! The biggest one in all of America, no less.

  Her husband was a toff, Roddy could see it from the photographs, but she said he was very good to her and that she loved him very much. From the looks of things, she’d done a damn sight better for herself with this bloke than she would have with Joe Bristow. The thought of how Joe had treated her still rankled at times, but Roddy’s feelings toward him had long since softened.

  He could still see the lad as he looked when he’d returned from New York. Hollow. As if his very heart had been torn out. He’d given Roddy four pounds that he had left over, a promise to pay back the remainder, and a newspaper that showed photographs of Fiona and her new husband and told all about their wedding. Roddy had made him come in and drink a glass of whiskey. He hadn’t had the heart to tell him he’d received a letter from Fiona two days after he’d left. He hadn’t seen much of him after that. He’d come on two or three occasions to pay off his debt and that was it.

  In all the letters he’d had from Fiona over the years, she’d never asked about Joe. And Roddy had never mentioned him. Why stir up old hurts? He’d never mentioned Bowler Sheehan, either, or his claim that she’d stolen money from William Burton. The whole thing still puzzled him, but after he’d learned she was in New York, he’d stopped worrying that Sheehan would harm her. He’d never known her to be anything less than honest, but maybe she’d been so desperate to get away from here, from, her grief, that she’d relieved Burton of a few quid to do it. So what? He’d had plenty to spare.

  In every letter he’d written to her, he asked her to come back to visit. He would so love to see her and Seamie again and meet her husband. She’d always declined, however, citing Nicholas’s poor health. She had invited him and his family to New York, too. Countless times. He wanted to go, but he couldn’t face the long sea voyage. His weak stomach would make the two weeks a misery. The only time he’d been on a boat was when he’d traveled from Dublin to Liverpool with Michael and Paddy. He’d spent the entire journey with his head over the railing and the Finnegans laughing at him. His eyes crinkled with merriment at the memory.

  Paddy … Christ, how I miss him, he thought. His smile faded. If only he hadn’t taken the watchman’s shift that night … things would have been so different. They’d all still be here … Paddy, Kate, the children. That was all Paddy had wanted – his family and the means to provide for them. It wasn’t a lot to ask for. Not much at all.

  His memories were interrupted as he nearly crashed into a woman walking past him. Her head was down. “Sorry, guv,” she mumbled as she shuffled past. “Didn’t see you in the fog.”

  He caught a glimpse of red hair. He knew her. “Alice? That you?”

  She turned around. “Aye, it’s me. Is that you, Sergeant? I can’t see too well this evening.”

  Roddy drew a sharp breath. “Who did this?” he asked.

  “Punter.”

  “Just now?”

  “Last night.”

  He steered her over to a street lamp and inspected her face. Her eyes were swollen to slits. There was dried blood in the corner of one, more in her nostrils. Her cheek was mottled like bad fruit.

  “Jaysus, Alice. You know him?”

  She shook her head. “Never seen ’im before. Wouldn’t ’ave gone with ’im, but ’e offered me a shilling. Looked like a toff, ’e did. When we got back to my room, ’e went barmy. Kept saying, ’I found you, I found you.’ Beat me silly. Went on and on about rats, then pulled a knife on me. Thought I was done for, I don’t mind saying, but I made ’im see that there weren’t no rats and ’e calmed down.”

  “You should have those eyes looked at.”

  “Chance would be a fine thing, guv. I’m skint. Going to see your man down the Bells. ’Oping ’e’ll give me a glass on the never. That’ll take the pain away.”

  Roddy reached into his pocket and handed her sixpence. “Get somet’ing to eat first.”

  Alice tried to smile but winced instead. “You’re all right, Sergeant.”

  “Mind what I said. Get yourself some soup.”

  “I will. Ta, guv.”

  The hell you will, Roddy thought, watching her go. You’ll run right down to the Bells and drink it all. As the fog closed around her, he realized that even if Jack was dead, his spirit lived on in these mean streets. In the bastard who’d beaten Alice. In the barman who would note her swollen eyes and shortchange her. In the lads who’d taunt her and rob her of any remaining coins she had as she staggered home. In the hunger and misery of all the Alices and Lizzies and Maggies who shivered on street corners selling themselves for fourpence. In the callous brutality of someone like Bowler Sheehan who’d burned forty families out of their homes for a few quid. In the cold ambition of up-and-comers like Sid Malone who were only too eager to outdo him.

  Roddy shivered, chilled by more than the fog. Suddenly he wanted to be in his bright, cheerful house. With Grace fussing over him and his supper warm from the oven. He turned and headed north. For home. And a brief night’s escape from all of the unfinished business.

  Chapter 59

  Nicholas Soames, New York’s most celebrated art dealer and a darling of city society, leaned on his silver-topped walking stick and regarded his wife of ten years with a grin. Though she had asked him to come to the riverside that morning, to the cavernous brick building that housed TasTea’s operations to see her latest project, she was now so caught up in her work she was completely unaware he’d arrived.

  “The new machine is beautiful, Nick,” she’d told him over breakfast. “Just breathtaking! You’ve got to see it. Come after lunch. Promise you will!”

  And he had, though he shouldn’t have. These days, the smallest exertions brought on the pain. He felt it now – tiny slivers of glass stabbing at his heart. Over the last two years his condition had worsened dramatically, but he’d managed to hide a good deal of his decline from Fiona. He knew that the truth would upset her, and more than anything in the world he wanted to shield her from unhappiness. She’d already had so much more than her share.

  She stood about twenty yards away from him, utterly absorbed by the huge noisy contraption in front of her. Nick shook his head. Only his Fee could find this heap of clanking metal appealing. He had absolutely no idea what it was or what it did; he only knew that she’d had it made in Pittsburgh for the astronomical sum of fifty thousand dollars and that she intended for it to do nothing less than revolutionize the tea trade. As he watched her, his smile – one made up of equal parts love, pride, and amusement – broadened, warming his pallid complexion. “Just look at you!” he clucked. She had looked so polished, so elegant, when she’d left the house earlier. Now she looked an absolute fright.

  She had thrown her jacket over a stool as if it were an old dish towel. The sleeves of her white blouse were rolled up; there was a smear of black grease across one. Her hair was wild; strands had come undone from the neat twist she always wore. She was snapping her fingers unconsciously, talking to someone hidden by the machine. He could see her face in profile; her expression was lively and intense. How he adored that face.

  As Nick continued t
o gaze at his wife, the machine suddenly rumbled to life, startling him. He followed Fiona’s gaze to its maw and saw that red TasTea tins were emerging from it in an orderly procession along a conveyor belt. Fiona grabbed the first tin and tore its lid off. She pulled out what looked like a tiny white bag and examined it.

  “Goddammit!” she shouted, her voice more American now than English. She pulled out another bag, and another. Then she put her thumb and forefinger in her mouth and gave a piercing whistle. There was the sound of metal grinding and then the machine stopped. “Stuart!” she yelled. “They’re still tearing! Every bloody one of them!”

  Nick blinked in surprise as a head suddenly popped out from under a devilishly complex conglomeration of gears, plates, and tracks. It was Stuart Bryce, Fiona’s second-in-command. She had hired him away from Millard’s eight years ago.

  “What?” he hollered. “I can’t hear you! This sodding thing’s made me deaf!”

  “It’s the tension on the rollers, it has to be,” she shouted, handing him one of the bags.

  Another voice was heard from under the machine. Nick assumed it belonged to the pair of feet next to Stuart’s head. “It can’t be! We’ve adjusted the roller three times!”

  “Then adjust them a fourth time, Dunne! You’re the mechanic, aren’t you?”

  Nick heard a snort of disgust, then: “It’s not the rollers, Mrs. Soames. It’s the stapling mechanism. The staple edges are tearing the fabric as the bags pass through.”

  Fiona shook her head. “The edges are too raggedy. The cut would be clean if a staple made it. It’s the tension, Dunne. The muslin’s being pulled apart, not sliced. Now are you going to fix it, or am I?”

  “I’d like to see you try.”

  Oh dear, Mr. Dunne, Nick thought, wrong move altogether. He took Fiona’s jacket off the stool, folded it, and sat down to watch the fireworks.

  Fiona stood there for a few more seconds, glaring at Dunne’s feet, then picked up a wrench, crawled under the conveyor belt, and made for the center of the machine. Her skirt caught on a nail jutting from a floorboard. She yanked it. It tore. Nick flinched. Hand-woven Venetian silk. Fashioned in Paris by Worth. Oh, well.