‘I shall not tell you, sir, what he did to me then. Only . . . Before him, I would fly from my body, you see? Always. Like a bird, until it was done. But I cannot escape him. The pain and the fear, I think he will kill me. I dare not fly away. I am trapped. And I begin to think no, Gabriela, no. You are strong. You are not a child. Your family drown but you survive. You live. And I take my fists like this, still bound, and I push him away. I kick and shove until I am free. I pull off the blindfold and I run to the door, screaming, screaming.
‘Mr Burden stands there. He looks angry. He tells me I am a stupid whore, that I must not make trouble. I run past him towards the stairs, towards life. I am bleeding but I am free. Then I feel his arms about my waist, pulling me back. I try to fight, but he is too strong, like a nightmare. He carries me back up the stairs to the room. He throws me down on the bed. He puts his weight upon my back, pushes my head into the pillow and I can barely breathe. He says, “Be quiet, slut. Earn your keep.”
The other man thanks him. He points to his face – there is a small cut on his brow, just a light scratch. He takes his knife and says, “Hold her down. The bitch will pay for this.”’
Gabriela pulled her knees up beneath her chin, wrapped her arms around her legs.
‘When it was done they left me to bleed. I was too weak to move, too shocked. One of the maids found me. When Aunt Doxie saw, she cursed me. Cursed me. I was ruined, close to death. Worthless. She pushed me out on to the street. I don’t remember no more. I must have staggered into St Giles – I don’t know how. I should have died in the gutter. I think I wanted this. But see, here I am.’ She turned to me at last. ‘I survive.’
‘How?’
She smiled, like an angel – her eyes shining. ‘James. He found me. He carried me to his brother’s friend, Dr Sparks. He saved my life.’
Nathaniel Sparks – Samuel Fleet’s great friend. Kitty’s father had saved Gabriela. ‘Gabriela . . . you know that Kitty . . .’
‘His daughter. Of course! I know Kitty, when she was very tiny. My God the noise. She cry, cry, cry. I think I go deaf. That’s why we save you last night. For Kitty. What – you think I fall in love with your legs?’ She smiled again. A light had returned to her face, now the worst of her story was over.
If I were a wise man, I would have left her then. Everything I had feared was true. So leave, now – and quickly. Run from this world of butchery, murder and revenge. Grab Kitty’s hand and flee the city and let this tragedy play to its end without you. But I didn’t move. I stayed quite still, pressed into the chair. I must know it all.
‘The brothel burned down.’
Gabriela’s eyelids grew heavy. ‘Yes.’
‘Two people, burned alive.’ Aunt Doxie, and the man she would not name. Who did not deserve a name. Lost and unmourned for ever. ‘James did this for you?’
‘Yes.’ And there was love in her voice.
‘But he spared Joseph Burden.’
‘No, sir. We did not spare him.’ She hugged her knees to her chest. ‘I still dream of that night. So many times. I had escaped that room, you understand? But he dragged me back there. He held me down. You think to kill him was enough? A few moments of pain?
‘The night James burned down the brothel we could not find him. He’d fucked one of the new country girls. A fresh maid. Worth good money. Aunt Doxie found out and she have him kicked from the door. James and Samuel, they search the town and at last they find him. On his knees in church, sobbing like a child. He knows why the brothel burns down. He knows that now is his turn. James was going to slit his throat, but Samuel . . . Well. You knew Samuel, sir.’
Oh, yes. I knew Samuel Fleet. Never once chose a straight path if a crooked one were on offer. Or better yet, a maze of his own devising, full of twists and turns and general confusion.
‘Samuel said, “Think, Brother, is it not better to let the man live and suffer? Why should he escape the miseries of existence?” You remember, this is how he talks?’
‘I remember.’
‘He says, “Mr Burden – you train as a carpenter, yes? So you will take up your trade once more. You will become a respectable citizen, go to church, read the Bible. You will marry and have children. All that you earn, you will pay to us. And one day we will come back and we will finish what was begun today. We will take your life. But not today. And perhaps not tomorrow. If you run, we will find you. If you try to speak of this, we take you and we kill you slowly. So you think that burning alive is a mercy.” ’
Only Samuel Fleet could have dreamed up such a plan. It was so elegant, so cruel. So profitable. How he must have enjoyed watching Burden, trapped all those years in a dull, virtuous life. I doubted Fleet could imagine a worse torture for any man.
‘Twenty years, we let him live. He works like a dog and we take his money. Twenty years – always afraid one night my husband will come for him. I wonder sometimes if his heart burst from fear. But he lives. He marries and has children.’
‘Ned said his mother was a whore.’
‘His mother was a young girl. The country girl that Joseph Burden took for himself. Aunt Doxie threw her out too. She have nothing, so she steals. And she is caught.’
I sighed at the thought of another broken life. Ned’s mother had pled her belly at Newgate. Her son had saved her for that short while, but then she had died on her way to the colonies. ‘You made Burden take Ned in.’
Gabriela drained her glass. She was tired, of a sudden. ‘So. There is my story.’
‘But it is not finished.’
‘No.’ A long pause. ‘Samuel was killed in gaol. Of course he had lived next door to Burden for several years. He found it amusing. He would say, “Good morrow, neighbour, what – has my brother not killed you yet?” He said to Burden, “you must thank me”. That he was the only one who could persuade James to spare his life. And this was true. Samuel said to James, let the children grow up first. I agreed with this; they are innocent. When Samuel died, Burden knew his own death was coming.’
And now I understood Burden’s strange behaviour in the weeks preceding his murder. He knew he could be killed at any moment. He brought his son home from school to be close to him in his last days. He refused to move house, knowing that all the profits from his business had drained into James Fleet’s pocket. He refused to give Ned a position for the same reason. And – my God, of course. He forced himself on Alice. Ned couldn’t understand Burden’s behaviour in the last weeks of his life – it had seemed so out of character. The truth was quite the reverse. It was the previous twenty years that had been out of character for Burden. He may have gained some bullying satisfaction from his work with Gonson and the Society, but his natural inclination was very different. Why not fuck his maid, when Death lurked around every corner? When Gabriela’s son moved in next door, silent and watchful?
Sam Fleet, with his mother’s curls, his father’s black-eyed stare, and his uncle’s name. Sam Fleet, who crept into Burden’s house in the middle of the night. Practising.
Sam had grown up looking into his mother’s scarred face every day. He must have heard her screaming at night, when the dreams came. I had rejected him as the killer because he had no reason for it and because of the ferocity of the attack. In fact he had the strongest motive to kill Joseph Burden. Beneath that still surface he must have been in turmoil for weeks.
I must accept the truth, much as it pained me. Sam was Burden’s killer. Hadn’t I asked the boy that night, when we stood over the butchered, bloody corpse?
Did you do this, Sam?
And he had answered with his own question.
Why would I kill him?
Gabriela’s story had woven a spell upon me, while the snow storm blew through the town. Or perhaps it was just that I was exhausted, and sickened to my soul. I understood why she and James would seek revenge upon Burden. I could almost applaud them for the way they had extracted that revenge over the past twenty years, as long as I did not think upon Burden’s children an
d the dismal effect it had had on their own, blameless lives. But to send Sam to live next door . . . they must have known what would happen.
‘Did you order your son to kill Burden?’
Gabriela untucked her feet and stretched. ‘I think he is too young. But James say, “He cannot be apprentice all his life”, and I understand. It is a mother’s wish to keep her children always young, and safe. But Sam is fourteen. He is not a boy.’
So it was as I had feared. Sam had been sent to live at the Cocked Pistol in order to murder Joseph Burden. James Fleet had never wanted a gentleman for a son – he’d wanted a killer. It was, after all, a family business.
We both fell silent. Downstairs, Fleet’s men were still caught in a rowdy game of cards. Someone was playing a tune on a penny whistle, shrill and jaunty. My head was throbbing from the wine, and the heat of the fire. I should leave. Fleet would return home soon. If he knew that I suspected Sam, I was sure he would kill me. I had begun to wonder about Gabriela, too. Had she kept me here all this time, waiting for her husband to arrive?
‘You wonder how to leave,’ Gabriela said, toying with the gold brooch at her chest. ‘You are afraid.’
‘Foolish not to be.’
‘Foolish.’ A half-smile. ‘You are clever in your own world. A gentleman’s world. But here . . . Ahh, sir. How I wish you had not come here. I wished it from the first moment you walked into this room. I am thinking, thinking . . .’ She tapped her forehead. ‘How to save you. I should like to save you, Mr Hawkins. A shame for you to die.’
I shifted slowly in my seat, thinking of the dagger tucked in my coat. I could reach for it in a heartbeat. And, what? Stab her? Could I really do such a thing?
‘I must protect Sam,’ she said. ‘And you are fond of him too, I think.’
‘Yes.’
Her smile deepened. ‘You are a good man.’
‘Sometimes.’ And what splendid rewards it brought me. ‘You shouldn’t have sent him to me. I thought I was helping him. I knew he was the thief, that night. In my heart I knew it. I should have stopped him.’
‘You cannot stop a tiger, Mr Hawkins.’
I stared at her, speechless. Is that how she saw her son? As a tiger? He was not a predator, for God’s sake. He was a boy. And between her pride and my neglect, we had lost him.
‘I have a suggestion, Mr Hawkins. Kitty tells me this morning about Alice. About her dress. Covered in blood . . .’ She raised an eyebrow.
I nodded, struggling to keep an even expression. I understood her meaning. If I was willing to accuse Alice of Burden’s death and use the dress as evidence, I would be free to leave. Otherwise – I would not escape St Giles with my life. I pretended to consider the proposition. Rubbed my face wearily. ‘Yes. Very well.’
I rose to my feet, turning to the window. It was still dark, but the roofs were covered in snow that glowed in the moonlight. Gabriela rose too. She was very beautiful in this strange half-light. I had been watching her for so long that I hardly noticed the scar any more, though it cut so deep through her brow, and down to her jaw. She leaned closer, and for a strange, fluttering moment I thought she meant to kiss me. But no, no – I caught the tightening around her eyes. The sudden set to her mouth. I leaped back just as she sprang forward, pulling the brooch from her chest. Not a brooch but the hidden top of a dagger, slid between her breasts.
I was a good man. And she had not believed me.
She swiped again with the blade, and I threw myself back, stumbling towards the balcony. The dagger sliced along my arm. I felt a sharp sting and then warmth as the blood began to flow. She was shouting now too, calling for aid.
I barrelled through the door out onto the balcony, groping desperately for the ladder. And now the household was in uproar – I could hear cries from below as Fleet’s men responded. The first footsteps upon the stairs. A moment later Eva ran into the room.
‘Ma!’ she gasped, her face white. ‘Ma, no!’
Gabriela spun around, distracted. I grabbed the ladder and flung it across the gap. It hit the roof opposite with a dull thud, knocking away a patch of fresh snow. I had to clamber up – it was the only way across to safety. But all Gabriela had to do was snatch the ladder from this side and I would fall. I hesitated, clutching my wounded arm. And suddenly Eva pushed her way past her mother, throwing herself between us.
‘Eva!’ Gabriela snapped, furious.
‘Go!’ Eva hissed.
Without another thought, I clambered on to the ladder. It bowed under my weight, rocking a little with no one to hold it steady. I inched my way along, terrified that Gabriela would shove Eva aside and I would be tipped from the ladder to my death. But no, here was the rooftop ahead of me. I flung myself up on to the icy timber. The ladder scraped from the roof and crashed to the ground.
I lay on my back, the sky spinning above me as the cold air caught my breath. Snow melted through my clothes. Stand up, stand up. I rose carefully to my feet. Rooftops, stretching out far into the distance. Frosted rooftops, ice sparkling in the halflight. I put one foot out and it skated ahead of me. One careless step and I could break my neck.
On the balcony below, Gabriela was pointing up at me. One of Fleet’s men clambered down to collect the ladder, rested it against the house below me. He began to climb up to meet me.
I slid carefully to the other side of the roof. There was a balcony below. I jumped down, then dropped from there to the street, landing heavily on my hands and knees. I pulled the dagger from my coat and ran down Phoenix Street. If I could reach the Garden, the market traders would be filling the piazza. Fleet’s men would not risk attacking me in such a public fashion – it was not their way.
The streets were quiet and I must have seemed half-crazed, even for St Giles, with my dagger in hand. Who would risk attacking a man under James Fleet’s protection? And then, as I turned a corner he was there, in front of me. I ran straight into him.
We stared at each other, the one as surprised as the other. And I thought of the man behind me, only a few paces away.
Fleet recovered first. ‘Hawkins. What the devil . . .’
‘Gabriela. Sir, you must go to her now. She’s in danger. Run, sir, run!’
A tumble of words that made no sense. Only that I knew now his one weakness. How much he loved his wife, and the lengths to which he would go to protect her. Gabriela. Danger. It was enough. He didn’t stop to wonder why I was in St Giles. Why I was running in the opposite direction. He thought only of his wife. He ran towards her, and I fled through the streets, faster than I had ever run in my life.
As I reached the turning to Long Acre, I was almost crushed beneath the wheels of a vegetable cart. I leaped to the pavement, panting hard, my heart hammering against my chest.
‘You stupid arsehole!’ the cartman yelled over his shoulder. ‘Almost killed you!’
I waved my apologies. People were staring. My stockings were soaked and ripped from my scrabble across the rooftop, my wig and hat lost in the chase.
I didn’t care. I was safe – and I had the truth. Now I must decide how to use it.
Chapter Eighteen
‘You must leave the city. At once.’
I leaned over the hot punch and breathed in its steam. ‘I know, Betty. I know.’
We were hidden in a quiet corner at Moll’s. I’d sat at this table many times before, nursing a sore head after another night’s debauch. But it was not liquor that made my head pound now, or my hands shake. I reached for my tobacco and built another pipe, conscious of Betty studying me hard under those thick black lashes. She knew that I had run foul of Fleet’s gang, nothing more. Anyone who knew Gabriela’s story would be in danger, and I had no wish to put Betty’s life at risk.
I drank a glass of punch in silence. After the exhilaration and relief of my escape, here was the crash back down to earth. I should go home, pack my belongings and leave within the hour. But home meant Sam. I couldn’t face him, not yet. I couldn’t bear to look into those black eyes
and see the truth staring back at me.
I had never felt so angry before. My body was shaking with it. I had witnessed cruelty before – even murder. But James Fleet’s crime, and Gabriela’s . . . surely even God couldn’t forgive it. They had corrupted their only son beyond all hope of return. A boy of fourteen. If I reached out and told this story to the man at the next table, his head bent low over his Daily Courant, he would shrug his shoulders. Some black-hearted villain from St Giles raises his son to be a killer. What of it? What news was this? Sam had lived among thieves and murderers all his life. Why should any of this matter? Son of a whore, son of a cut-throat gang captain. If any boy had been born and raised to kill, it was Sam.
But there were other paths he could have taken, with that sharp, inquisitive mind. He could have been a lawyer or a stockbroker or a physician or an anything he damned well chose, given time. And now? Even if he escaped the rope, those paths were closed to him for ever. He had stolen into a house and stabbed a man to death. It would shape the rest of his life. How could it not?
How could a father want this for his son? Even a killer such as James Fleet – did he not dream of better for his only boy? And I wondered – did he send Sam to me with an order to kill Burden? Or had he simply placed him next door and waited for the inevitable act? Did he think that absolved him of the sin? No – Fleet would care nothing of absolution. He was a murderer many times over. He must have ordered the boy to do it.
I thought of Sam creeping around the Burdens’ home at night, knife in hand. Practising. He’d confessed in that one word, but I’d refused to hear it. He’d tiptoed into Burden’s bedroom, ready to strike . . . only to find Alice Dunn curled up next to her master. An unexpected complication. He couldn’t kill Burden in front of a witness – she would have woken the whole house. So he’d waited for another night, when Burden was alone – then thrown suspicion on poor Alice.
The Last Confession of Thomas Hawkins Page 23
