‘One way or another I’ll find out why you lied to me, Alefounder.’
‘Didn’t I make myself clear?’ Mayne interrupted. ‘This man doesn’t have to answer or justify himself in any way to you; I’ll ask you to refrain from making threatening remarks as well.’
‘It stinks that you’re absolving him of any responsibility in this matter just because he’s wealthy and has connections.’
‘ That’s it,’ Mayne said, looking at Tilling. ‘Get this man out of here and escort him from the building.’
Tilling gave Mayne a look that said: I told you so. Alefounder said nothing and wiped his forehead with a handkerchief.
Outside, in the corridor, Pyke felt a tug on his arm, and turned around. Fitzroy Tilling’s face was as tight as a drum. ‘Bravo, Pyke, I thought you handled yourself with enormous tact.’
‘Alefounder lied and he’s been given a pat on the back. If he was poor or a valet, he’d be rotting in prison by now.’
‘I can’t make sense of you. You’ve spent most of your life cheating and swindling to fatten your own purse and yet you despise people who have money.’
‘I don’t hate people with money. But when I see a man like Alefounder dismiss the murder of a poor, black woman as though it doesn’t even merit his consideration, I want to drive a stake through his heart.’
‘And that’s normal? God, Pyke, can’t you see how much your anger blinds you to the truth?’
‘What’s that supposed to mean? Alefounder escapes censure or interrogation just because of who he knows.’
‘Do you think you’re the only one who cares about Mary Edgar?’ The blood had risen in Tilling’s face.
‘Forgive me if I don’t think Mayne and the others took her death quite as seriously as they did that of a murdered aristocrat.’
‘By others you mean me?’
‘What do you want me to say? Bedford is murdered. Within hours of his corpse being discovered, fifty men have been assigned to find his killer.’
‘You still don’t understand, do you?’
‘Understand what?’
‘I could have assigned twenty men to investigate Mary Edgar’s murder but I thought of you because I could see you needed help.’ Tilling shook his head. ‘I even arranged for your early release from prison, and how do you go about repaying me?’
‘But that’s exactly my point. It wouldn’t have happened if she’d been rich and white. You wouldn’t have been allowed.’
‘I made a decision to employ you without consulting my superiors. Now that decision has come back to bite me. Perhaps it was my fault, but now they’re baying for your scalp. I can’t help that.’
‘So I should roll over and die like a whipped dog?’
Tilling turned to walk away but hesitated at the last moment. ‘I used to think I knew you; that I knew who you were and what you stood for. And in spite of some of the things you did I respected you, too. Now I look at you and all I can see is a man on the verge of drowning. I want to help, but I don’t know how. I throw you a line and you throw it straight back in my face.’
It was Tilling’s pity more than his anger which cut the deepest.
‘It wasn’t your gift to give. If it was, how could Mayne snatch it away from me so easily?’
Tilling shook his head. ‘This isn’t about Mary Edgar or wanting to find whoever killed her. You just want to make us look bad.’
‘Can’t you simply accept I might want to do something… good?’ He couldn’t find a better word and stared at Tilling, not knowing what else to say.
‘When it comes down to it, Pyke, you’re a selfish creature. You are now and you always have been. If you were honest about it, I might be able to forgive you. But you’re doing what you’ve always done: constructing a spurious morality to fit the circumstances you find yourself in.’
Pyke could feel his pent-up anger burning the tips of his ears. Tilling was already walking away from him along the corridor, his heels clipping in a tight-lipped fury. Then Pyke was alone in an unfamiliar building, and more than anything he wanted to run to the nearest apothecary and lose himself in a tincture of syrupy laudanum.
‘I’m worried about him, Pyke. I think you should be, too.’ Godfrey stood at the window of his apartment. It was the following afternoon and Felix was talking with an older, scruffily dressed boy below them on the street.
‘Then you shouldn’t encourage him to read things he’s not ready for.’ Pyke turned to face his uncle. ‘I never wanted you to write that damned book in the first place. I certainly never expected that my own son would read it.’
Godfrey reddened slightly. ‘I’m not his father, Pyke. It’s not my responsibility to tell him what he should and shouldn’t be reading.’
Pyke bowed his head. ‘I’m sorry. You’re right. I shouldn’t have said that.’
‘Apology accepted.’ Godfrey paused. ‘Did you know that he was caught playing truant from school today?’
‘That’s probably my fault. I ambushed him and Jo yesterday morning on their way to school and persuaded them to accompany me to the zoological gardens.’
Pyke had joined his uncle at the window. He watched his son with a mixture of pride and consternation, amazed at how tall he had grown and how different he looked. Older, almost a man.
‘For a while he hardly left his room. Now he’s taken to spending more and more time outdoors.’
Pyke studied the lad Felix was talking to. It looked as though they were deep in conversation. ‘Do you know who the older boy is?’
Godfrey pushed his spectacles up his nose and frowned. ‘Never seen him before.’
‘I know you mean well,’ Pyke said, ‘and I don’t mind the lad pouring over the Newgate Calendar, but could you please make sure that he doesn’t read another word of Confessions?’
‘Point taken, dear boy.’ Godfrey cleared his throat. ‘But if you were to find somewhere large enough for you, Jo and Felix to live, you wouldn’t have to worry about the lad finding something morally degrading here in my apartment.’
Pyke had no answer to that, so he turned and went outside. As he walked down the steps, Felix looked at him. The older boy did, too, and then ambled across the street in the direction of Camden Place.
‘Is he a friend?’
Felix stared down at his boots. ‘I just met him.’
‘What were you talking about?’
‘Just things.’
Pyke looked at the older boy, who’d turned around and was grinning. ‘I don’t want you to talk to him again.’
‘He admired my coat.’
‘I said I don’t want you to see him again. Is that understood?’
Felix looked up at him defiantly. ‘I’m not a child any more.’
‘I know.’ Pyke waited. ‘But child or not, you shouldn’t play truant from school.’
‘They don’t teach us anything worth learning, so why should I go?’
‘Because I say so.’ It was an inadequate response, but Pyke couldn’t think of a better one.
Felix dug his hands into his pockets. ‘Have you found us a place to live yet?’
‘Is that what you really want?’
Pyke hadn’t wanted to ask this question for fear that Felix might, when it came down to it, prefer to remain at Godfrey’s. As it happened, Felix just shrugged and mumbled that of course it was what he wanted.
‘I’m looking for somewhere. Really I am. But you have to be patient.’ Pyke hesitated, wondering whether to say what was on his mind. ‘In the meantime I’m trying to do something that will make you proud of me.’
That got Felix’s attention. ‘Why do you want me to be proud of you?’ The idea seemed difficult for him to grasp.
‘For one thing, I don’t want you to think of me as that character in Godfrey’s book.’
A brief silence passed between them. Felix scrunched up his face. ‘That person stole from time to time and he even killed a few people.’
‘Like I said, he’s a made-up ch
aracter.’
‘But that man in the bookshop accused you of killing the other man’s father.’ Felix’s face was hot with fear and indignation.
‘There are some things you’re not old enough to understand.’ Pyke looked up and saw that Jo was in the front window, watching them.
‘So it is true, then.’ Felix’s eyes were bulging. ‘He said you stabbed the other man’s father in the neck and threw him out of a window.’
Pyke could feel the heat under his collar. What was he supposed to say? What could he say? ‘That man was a liar and a drunkard. You shouldn’t believe him over your own father.’
‘So why did you agree to fight him in a duel?’
Flummoxed, Pyke tried to think of different ways to answer Felix’s question. He tried to think how Emily might have answered it but she had known Felix only as a young boy; now he was maturing rapidly. She would have been so proud of him, Pyke decided. But she still wouldn’t have known how to answer all his questions.
In the end, Pyke told Felix it was nearly dinner time and made him promise not to miss any more school. Reluctantly Felix agreed and followed Pyke up the steps to the apartment and then went on to his bedroom.
‘What do you know about Jemmy Crane?’ Pyke asked Godfrey, once he was sure they were alone.
‘Crane?’ Godfrey’s face was suddenly creased with worry.
‘He said he knew you.’
‘We used to know some of the same people back in the old days. Why do you ask?’
Briefly Pyke told his uncle about the murder investigation and his suspicions regarding Crane, and also about Field’s interest in Crane.
‘He’s a nasty one, that’s for sure. Ruthless, too. He used to be an associate of Dugdale’s back in the twenties. The market for free-thinking tracts on religion and politics died away and men like Crane and Dugdale turned to pornography. Dugdale clung on to his radical beliefs but Crane never had any such beliefs in the first place.’
‘You haven’t come across him for a while, then?’
‘Not for years. But I don’t doubt he’s the same as ever. A man like that wouldn’t think twice about slitting your throat if there was a profit in it.’ Godfrey hesitated. ‘But then again, you could say the same about Field.’
‘I know.’
‘Field once poured lamp oil down another man’s throat and lit it with a match. He read the newspaper while the man choked to death. I’m sure you’ve heard the stories.’
‘A rock and a hard place.’
Godfrey considered what Pyke had just said. ‘Of course, you could just walk away from everything. Spend some time with your son.’
Pyke let this last remark pass without an answer.
As he waited for a hackney carriage, Jo emerged from the apartment and joined him on the pavement. ‘I just wanted to say how much I enjoyed our trip to the zoological gardens.’ She shifted awkwardly from foot to foot.
‘Except it seems I’ve encouraged Felix to play truant from school.’
Her brow creased with worry. ‘I told Felix you’d be angry when you heard about it.’ She took off her bonnet and scratched the top of her head. It gave Pyke the chance to admire the colour of her hair. ‘I hope I didn’t assume too much.’
‘Not at all,’ he said, smiling. ‘Use me as much as you want to. If it helps, that is.’
Jo fiddled nervously with her hair. ‘Actually the reason I came out to speak with you is that Godfrey will be dining out on Wednesday
…’ She paused, perhaps flustered at the way this had come out. ‘What I meant was, Felix wanted to help cook a meal for you, and he, or rather we, wondered if you might come here to dine that evening.’
Pyke stared into her blue eyes and what felt like the briefest spark of attraction passed between them. ‘I’d be delighted to,’ he said, even before he’d had time to think about it.
‘Around seven?’
He nodded. ‘Until the day after tomorrow, then.’
Pyke watched her as she gathered up her skirt and climbed the steps to Godfrey’s apartment. As he did so, he wondered whether the idea for dinner had been hers all along.
TEN
Early the next morning, when the air was still cool, it took Pyke fifteen minutes to walk from the Whitechapel Road to the row of decrepit houses that Field had told him about — across from a scrubby field and a lake of stagnant water. The dwelling in question was a ramshackle cottage standing on its own at the far end of the lane. Pyke circled the property from a distance, trying to determine whether it was occupied, then crept up to each window, listening for voices or the sound of footsteps. From what he could tell, there were two or perhaps three men occupying a room at the back of the cottage — he could hear them talking. Making as little sound as possible, he tried the front door. Unsurprisingly it was locked and, using the jemmy and picklocks he’d brought with him, it took him the best part of five minutes to gain access to the front hallway. Once inside, he stood and listened, and when he was sure no one had heard him, he shuffled up the creaking staircase and tried the rooms immediately adjoining the landing. Both were unoccupied so he moved along the passageway. He was sweating slightly, and could feel his heart thumping against his ribcage. It was true that stumbling upon intruders was a terrifying experience for those whose houses were being invaded, but carrying out a burglary was just as unnerving.
The door at the far end of the passageway was unlocked, and when he opened it, Pyke had to pause and blink, to adjust to the sudden excess of light. Part of the roof was missing; initially he thought that the wind must have been responsible, but later he realised that the hole had been cut deliberately, to allow light to flood into the room. But Pyke’s gaze was drawn not to the hole in the roof but to the figure draped over a sofa in the middle of the room and the camera obscura resting on a wooden stool in front of her. She was perfectly naked. He stood there for a few moments but she neither moved nor reacted to his intrusion. It wasn’t until he crossed the room and shook her that he realised she was full of laudanum. Bessie Daniels, for it was undoubtedly her, stirred and looked at him through heavy-lidded eyes; when she tried to speak through her hare-lip, her words were slurred to the point of incoherence. Pyke found a sheet and threw it over her, then inspected the camera.
He had read about the process, invented by a Frenchman, Louis Daguerre, but this was the first time he had actually seen up close how it worked. Light — as much as possible, hence the cutting away of the roof — flooded through the camera lens and the resulting image was captured on a copperplate which had been exposed to an iodine solution, forming a light-sensitive silver iodide. The plate would then be developed over heated mercury, which would amalgamate with the silver, and finally the image would be fixed in a solution of salt water. The exposure took fifteen minutes, during which time the subject had to remain still; something that perhaps explained why Bessie had been drugged.
‘Bessie.’ Pyke shook her arm and in the process noticed an amethyst ring on one of her fingers, a serpent motif carved into the bright purple stone.
She stirred again and gave him a bewildered stare. ‘Eh?’
‘Harold Field sent me.’ He waited for a reaction.
She looked at him, confused. Pyke could smell gin and laudanum on her breath. For a while, he wasn’t sure she’d understood what he’d said, but then she fell back on to the sofa and giggled. ‘Tell him
…’
Pyke waited. ‘Tell him what?’
More giggling. Down below he could hear voices. Footsteps, too.
‘Tell him what, Bessie?’
‘Morel-Roux.’
That made him pay attention. ‘The valet? What’s he got to do with it?’
But she wouldn’t answer him.
Pyke decided he could leave her where she was — and come back and talk to her later, when she was sober — or he could take her with him. He opted for the latter. Scooping Bessie up in his arms, he staggered to the door and heaved her up over his shoulders. She was as lim
p as a corpse. At the top of the staircase, he steadied himself and gripped the banister. He had made it halfway down when a door opened below him and he heard someone say, ‘Is it time?’ There was nowhere to run. Pyke tried to take the final few steps two at a time but they were on to him before he’d reached the bottom, two of them, one armed with a pistol.
‘Put her down slowly and raise your hands.’ One of the men, with a hatchet face, called out to Crane. Pyke did as he was told. Bessie Daniels giggled as Pyke laid her down on the floor.
Crane appeared in the hallway. ‘Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t tell Sykes to pull the trigger and blow a hole the size of my fist in your chest.’
Pyke took a moment to run through his options. He could always try to bolt for the door but Sykes would surely fire the pistol and, at such close range, he would probably hit his target.
‘Make your choice, sir. Tell me why you came here or prepare to meet your maker.’ Crane smoothed back his hair and wiped his hands on his trousers.
Pyke stared down at Bessie’s comatose body. ‘I was asked to find this particular woman.’
Crane seemed amused by this notion. ‘By?’
Pyke waited, deciding that only the truth would do. ‘Harold Field.’ It was a huge risk, giving up Field’s name, but Pyke knew that most people were afraid of him and mentioning Field might make Crane more likely to talk.
As expected Crane’s whole demeanour changed. His shoulders tightened and his forehead creased with worry. ‘What does Field want with her?’
‘I don’t know. I didn’t ask. I owed Field money. This was how he demanded I repay my debt.’
They stared at one another for a few moments. Less sure of himself, Crane told Sykes and the other man to leave them alone — but also to remain close by in case Pyke tried to make a dash for it.
‘Are you telling me you have nothing invested in this little action?’ Crane said, once they were alone.
‘That’s right.’
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