The Dark Water
Page 33
Bulweather turned back to face us. ‘Cream went into a fury. He cursed and hit the walls. After a time, I told him I wanted no more of this. He cursed more and said I was a damned coward and a fool. But, in truth, he barely cared. In fact, he was probably glad to have it all to himself. He knew there was a map somewhere with a code, and intended to get his hands on it and solve the riddle. Already he suspected Harding, for he knew Jefford had talked to the man. After that, I never saw him again.’
I said nothing. In the end. I had trusted this man and liked him, even loved him a little. It was sickening to me to find he was an accomplice of Cream.
There was a long silence in the room.
Bell broke it. ‘And how,’ he said, ‘how would you like me to proceed? Do you wish me to call Langton? I am prepared to report the good you have done us as well as the bad, but these are matters that can hardly be overlooked.’
Again there was silence. Bulweather went to his great dog and patted it so that its tail wagged furiously.
‘I think I must admit I have appetites that would not meet with universal approval,’ he said at last, and he looked very old and grey now. ‘But I could not spend my life in prison and it is true to say I love this community. I will therefore ask a favour. If you agree not to mention what has been said here, I will not trouble you or anyone else further. You will tell my housekeeper that word came of an urgent case. I am known, you will recall, as an intrepid cliff-walker.’
I saw Bell sizing this up. Then he nodded. Bulweather gave his dog one last pat. ‘You will go to my sister,’ he whispered. ‘She will come,’ and then he got up and turned to me.
‘I am glad of our conversations, Doyle,’ he said. ‘Let me just say that all I said to you I meant. I believe that to be true, in spite of my own weaknesses.’ Then he turned away and he was gone.
After he had left the room, neither of us spoke for a very long time. Finally, Mrs Harvey came and offered us more coffee, which we accepted. Since she looked a little troubled, the Doctor told her of how her employer had been called away on a case and we would stay till mid-morning and then take our leave. At this she brightened. ‘Oh he is always so busy,’ she said with a smile in her Irish brogue. ‘But I will keep something warm for his return.’ And she left us.
We sat on in that room, in a strange silence, knowing we would not be disturbed. The past twenty-four hours had been so momentous for both of us we just wanted quiet and thought before the fire.
Eventually Bell did offer his view of Bulweather. ‘It is my belief,’ said the Doctor, ‘he was not always a bad man. But it seems from all I can discover he was already in secret a considerable lecher. Cream would have found him perfect material.’
About eleven, Bell suggested I should take one of the coats hanging up in the hall and walk the coastal path while he would hobble to the inn and talk to Langton. For Bulweather’s sake, we would keep our side of the agreement and mention nothing of what we had learnt in this room.
Outside it was bright if still bitterly cold. I had little appetite for making the excursion to the cliffs again, even in such glorious weather. But in the event there was no need. On the beach, a fisherman and his family came running to tell me how a man had been found lying at the bottom of the cliff. He had fallen a good way and was dead. The wife recognised Bulweather and said it was widely known he would take great risks on his walks.
Bell was standing outside the Ship on my return and I told him the news. There was real emotion in his face as he reflected on it. ‘It was his choice,’ he said finally. ‘Pray God he is the last of the victims.’
We turned back to the Ship, which was, thanks to the protection of the slates and the fact that my room was on a projecting wing, still intact. My things were, of course, irrecoverable but it was no great loss, for there was nothing of great monetary or personal value, indeed they were all purchases I had made in Edinburgh.
The Doctor had already talked at length with Langton who soon reappeared to tell us a cab was on its way. He was as yet unaware of Bulweather’s death but rueful at the imminent arrival of the Scotland Yard man who, he was sure, would claim all the discoveries as his own. The detective seemed more than happy when Bell promised he would write a detailed account, offering a glowing report of the local police’s conduct of the investigation.
Later, as the cab came out of the trees for the last time and turned on to the Ipswich road, Bell told me his final piece of news.
‘From what I can gather, Doyle,’ he said, ‘there was nothing very much found in your room. Of course, the damage was very extensive, they are still going through it.’
I stared at him. ‘But surely,’ I said, ‘Bulweather mentioned they had found human remains.’
‘I know,’ said the Doctor, turning to survey the road ahead. ‘And we can hardly question him now about what he meant. There were all sorts of rumours last night. Perhaps he misunderstood them. They did find traces of a coat. It was badly burnt.’
‘His coat,’ I said. And I thought of that scream at the end. But I also thought of how the Doctor had screamed and deceived Cream. And the scream had not come from where I expected. ‘I know the coat was alight. But is it conceivable he got out of it and through the window?’
Bell turned to me. ‘Listen to me now — and I think you will agree I am nothing if not rational — there is no point in adding imagined doubts to a clear victory. You saw him burn. Even if he somehow survived and it is hard, if not impossible, to imagine, he must be mortally changed, perhaps half-dead. I am not, as you know, Doyle, a rash man. But I am prepared to wager we will hear nothing more.’
As I looked out on the fields in the midday sunshine with the great ditches receding into the infinity of sky, I prayed he was correct. My thoughts turned to the resumption of my practice in Southsea and to the prospect of being an ordinary doctor again. I consoled myself with the thought that, where Bell had been prepared to wager in the past, he was invariably right. Later we turned to speak of other things.
And Bell certainly seemed to be proved right. His wager held through the following year’s strange case involving a governess and the nightly ritual of the ‘Dead Time’, which I disguised years later in milder form as The Copper Beeches. It held through many other new developments in my life, indeed throughout all the investigations and changes which punctuated the 1880s. It was not until the spring of 1891, with the receipt of a fateful phonograph cylinder from America, that our hopes of final closure were shattered.
EPILOGUE
5.05p.m., Friday, 21 October 1898, Hindhead.
It is done. I spent this morning in London and then returned to finish my narrative. Now I close the second box and replace it on the low shelf at the back of my study beside the others containing materials relating to the cases. At last there is a proper record of our first encounter with him.
I have broken the strict vow of secrecy I offered Bell. But with reason. A little over three weeks ago, I received the first in a series of mysterious and anonymous parcels. The first contained a cryptic clue. The second a scarf I recognised. Years before it had belonged to Elsbeth who died on that beach near Edinburgh.
The third arrived two days ago but I do not understand the meaning of its contents. They appear to be nail clippings from fingers and foot. The postmark was Crewe. Of course anonymous, but indicating to me that somehow he is alive and is moving slowly towards me. The consequences, when he arrives, are unknowable but also unthinkable.
I am in one of the most difficult times of my life. My wife Louise’s condition continues very bad. Indeed, now I must go to her again. But I feel I have to complete this work before he makes it impossible for me to do so. Whatever happens to me, there will be then some record of the cases, those that concern him and the others.
I put the next box out, containing the matter of the ‘Dead Time.’ God willing, I can return to it in the morning.
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copyright © 2005 by David Pirie
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