Sidney Grice had the same expression as he wore when sorting out a difficult mathematical problem.
‘Punished?’ Freddy cried, with such passion that Lucy jumped. ‘I have certainly been punished - all these years of pain and disfigurement that will never get anything but worse. And for what? For being naive? For not wanting to be leered at by your disgusting brother?’ Freddy saw her fellow captive about to protest, but she would not be silenced. ‘If I had faults,’ she wept, ‘my God, they have been expiated.’ She strained every sinew of her body. ‘But know this, Lucy Bocking. When I saw you and Eric. . .’ Freddy gasped and fought to control her emotions. ‘And in all these years afterwards. . . I never condemned you – not once – because I thought that he had made you.’ Freddy almost choked. ‘I felt sorry for you.’
‘You felt sorry for me?’ Lucy tore uselessly at her bonds.
The bootmaker clapped Lucy’s shoulder in mirth. ‘Oh, this is rich.’ The man chuckled. ‘What a pair we have here.’
‘Shut your mouth,’ Lucy shrieked, but he roared with laughter, wrenching the dress aside to bare her shoulder.
I would have expected my guardian to be shocked, for I had known him to be nauseous at the sight of an ankle – especially one of mine – but he only said, ‘I can see one of your contusions now.’ He had the face of a poker player. ‘I told you I might.’
‘Well, I hope you are satisfied,’ she flared back.
‘I shall never be that.’
‘This has gone far enough.’ Pound clenched his fists impotently.
‘Oh, we have much further to go yet,’ the man vowed, and bared the other shoulder.
But Lucy paid no attention. She had the look of a beast now, her head rolling so violently that I thought she would dislocate her neck. ‘Want to know why I saved you, Freddy?’ The words sprayed messily from her mouth. ‘Because I wanted you to see how grotesque you had become.’
‘And how did Miss Wilde become so badly burned almost exclusively on the face?’ Sidney Grice pounced, and Lucy banged her head back on the chair with a great cracking sound.
‘The shovel,’ I realized.
‘I told you that you would work it out,’ my guardian said, with a tilt of his chin.
But Lucy looked at me venomously. ‘What the damn does it matter now?’ She was all at once still. ‘I found her on her back. She must have been overcome by the smoke, but she had staggered almost to the door before she collapsed. Her hair was singed but she did not look too badly hurt. My mother was there. She handed me the garden spade and told me to do what I had to. I think she meant for me to finish Freddy off, this prissy bitch who had caused all this trouble, and I had every intention of doing so. But, looking at that perfect button nose and beautiful bow lips, I had a better idea. There were some red-hot ashes nearby.’
Freddy howled but she could not shut the next words out.
‘I shovelled them on. By Satan, she sizzled.’ Lucy’s words were rapturous. ‘Even in all that smoke, I smelled the burning meat that was her flesh.’
‘Oh, how priceless.’ The bootmaker hooted and swapped hands with his knife. ‘What an excellent note to end on.’
And with that, he grasped the ivory handle of Sidney Grice’s revolver.
95
The Human Stain
I RAISED MY STARTING pistol a fraction.
‘But we have not talked about you yet,’ I pointed out, for I knew no man could resist that topic. And, seeing him tip his head in semi-assent, I continued, ‘You do not do it for gratification. You could get that in many places for the price of a drink. You do it because you hate women.’
‘Why, Miss Middleton, you should be an alienist.’ The bootmaker’s smile was forced this time, I thought, but he took his hand off the gun.
‘You are beyond medical help,’ I told him, and the smile congealed.
‘Do not talk to me about doctors.’ His fingers blanched on the knife handle.
‘There is one that we really ought to mention.’ I waved the gun in an attempt to relieve the cramp in my arm. ‘You see, we know that you murdered Mr Lamb.’
‘Oh yeah?’
‘The surgeon?’ Pound’s question went unanswered. He had edged another couple of inches.
‘And we know why.’ I looked the bootmaker in the eyes and saw them smoulder, his lips still fixed mirthlessly. ‘For the same reason,’ I said carefully, ‘that Lady Brockwood did not disable you with her knee. There was nothing for her to damage.’
The smile shrivelled into scorn. ‘It took you a long time to work that out.’
‘But those women never did you any harm,’ I burst out.
‘You think not?’ The embers burst into flame. ‘Have you any idea what it is to be despised for an injury that wasn’t your fault?’
‘Shall I answer that one?’ Freddy asked quietly, and the flames dipped briefly.
‘I take your point,’ the bootmaker conceded. ‘But it is different for men.’
‘Really?’ she demanded. ‘The only man I ever kissed screamed.’
The bootmaker wiped his nose on the inner bend of his elbow. ‘It is being laughed at that I cannot bear.’ He leaned towards her confidentially. ‘The first woman I went with was a widow. She knew what to expect and she mocked me. I ran away that time but never again.’ His mouth worked like a man building up spit. ‘The girls I go with now have no idea what to expect and half of them do not even understand what has happened. But there’s one thing for sure – they never laugh.’ He chewed at nothing. ‘You complain about screaming, but I like that part best and – once I get going – by Beelzebub, you should hear them squeal.’
‘But you are punishing innocent girls for what the medical profession did to you?’ I tried to reason with him.
‘One incompetent surgeon did for me,’ the bootmaker said matter-of-factly. ‘And I dealt with him. But there’s not a woman of the world who would not despise me if she knew, and so I take them before they have the chance.’ His tone became conversational. ‘When I was whole I was engaged to an heiress.’ He rested his elbow on Lucy’s left shoulder. ‘Very rich and not bad-looking. But I had a rupture lifting a crate that fell off a wagon on to my foot. I was worried I wouldn’t be able to consummate the marriage with that and it could be annulled, so I went to see Lamb. He said he could put me right, and then I caught cancer – or so he said. He was just supposed to clean me up.’ He looked at my guardian bitterly. ‘But when I came round from the ether, he said it was more advanced than he thought and he’d had to be more radical to save my life. I didn’t know what he meant until they changed the dressing.’
Sidney Grice jerked upright like a sentry caught almost asleep on duty. ‘And that is why you were so angry with Miss Bocking,’ he surmised, ‘and called her – to quote – a dirty dirty girl.’
‘I assumed she was a virgin,’ the bootmaker agreed. ‘But, when I found out she wasn’t, I realized that she would know what was wrong with me.’
‘I did not notice,’ Lucy reassured him. ‘I was in a drugged stupor and did not really believe it was happening.’
‘Did not?’ The bootmaker was incredulous. ‘Then I have hung around the square all these weeks, shouting rubbish and trying to sew leather, for nothing.’
‘But what,’ I asked, though I feared I knew the answer, ‘were you waiting for?’
‘Take a guess,’ he challenged.
‘You thought about it later and were worried that she would be able to tell the police about you, and they could check all hospital records,’ I surmised. ‘But how did you know where Lucy lived?’
‘I knew she and her friend were well-to-do by their accents and attire. So I toured all the good roads and squares until I saw a woman with a bruised face and another in a green veil coming out of this house.’ He looked at the calluses on the fingers of his left hand. ‘There’s not too many of them. I thought I would catch her alone to make it easier, but in the end I decided it would be safer to do it in the privacy of her own hom
e.’
‘So why did you turn from rape to murder?’ Pound enquired, as casually as one might ask for directions in the park. ‘It’s a very different crime.’
‘Not very,’ I argued. ‘Both of them are about crushing women.’
‘What God did not give you in looks he compensated for in brains.’ The bootmaker had a greater facility for backhanded compliments than my guardian, I mused. ‘But it was you who put me on the road to killing.’ He flapped his hands innocently. ‘Those two bitches in Limehouse – that was self-defence.’
‘And this?’ Pound asked calmly.
‘The same,’ the bootmaker reasoned. ‘You and your two friends and this filthy vixen.’ He tore at Lucy’s hair and she choked back a cry. ‘You’re all a threat to me, and now this mashfaced one too – you’re all witnesses. Besides,’ he smirked, ‘I rather enjoy it.’ He scratched the side of his nose and remembered something. ‘So what was that, you were saying about me being selected to do this cow?’ And, as he spoke, the bootmaker cut a line down Lucy’s cheek reminiscent of Prince Ulrich’s duelling scar, and she groaned but gritted her teeth.
Sidney Grice curled his fingers and examined the plates. ‘I thought I had explained that already,’ he said testily. ‘Wallace pretended to be drunk so that you would take his place. If you were wondering why he chose you particularly from all the flotsam he could sift through, I would remind you that he was very nearly imprisoned for his role in the attack upon the person of Miss Hockaday at your behest.’
‘But he couldn’t have known who I was,’ the bootmaker objected. ‘I kept my face well covered – told him I had a toothache.’
‘Jonathon Richard the Walrus Wallace liked to know who he was dealing with.’ My guardian rotated his hand to peer at his knuckles. ‘He had a trick which he adapted from an annoying practice of mine. The first time you met – when he contracted to help you entrap Miss Hockaday – Johnny slipped Lawsonia Inermis, better known to the hoi polloi as henna, into your drink. It was a simple thing thereafter to offer the local guttersnipes a meagre reward for spotting a man with orange-stained lips.’
‘It had turned brown by the time we first saw you,’ I recalled.
‘Sneaky crup.’ The bootmaker pulled his mouth down in grudging respect. ‘I wondered where I had got that. Thought it might be something I caught off a girl.’
‘The ladies might like to hum loudly whilst I make my next revelation.’ Sidney Grice hurumphed, but none of us took up his suggestion. ‘Not only can this detestable degenerate not spill seed, he cannot spill anything.’
The bootmaker turned puce. ‘What the hell are you talking about?’
‘I took a swab from Lady Dulcet Brockwood and there was blood aplenty and nothing but blood.’
‘What? You?’ The bootmaker actually looked queasy. ‘And they think I am disgusting.’
‘Oh, you are,’ Mr G assured him. ‘I dredge the drains. It is vermin like you that fill them.’
The bootmaker’s fist blanched on the handle of his knife.
‘What about Prince Ulrich?’ I asked, desperate for any delay that would give us a chance to do something, though I had no idea what it could be. ‘Why did you try to implicate him?’
The bootmaker spat on the floor. ‘That high-and-mighty foreigner strutting the streets like he owned them – so rich and handsome and titled. I bet he had no problems getting girls. But he wasn’t happy with all that.’ He wiped his mouth on his sleeve. ‘He had to set himself up as guardian-crudding-angel, stalking the East End and escorting girls home. He lost me a good few chances and he nearly had me cornered with that Hockaday bitch, and I bet you anything you like he did for Wallace. I thought about getting rid of him myself, but I was in enough trouble with Hanratty, and killing a member of the royal family is asking for trouble, to put it mildly. So then I thought why not make him suffer for my sins. I pointed the finger with that button and the accent. I put on some good clothes and I even sprayed some scent, but you were either too in awe of his rank or you saw through it.’
‘The latter,’ Mr G told him. ‘Amongst other factors, if you rip off a button sewn as thoroughly as the prince’s was, I would expect to find a few strands of cotton and possibly a piece of torn silk. The threads had been cleanly cut and the waistcoat was unscathed.’
‘Also you wore new boots that creaked,’ I contributed. ‘Prince Ulrich’s were oiled and softened.’
‘Didn’t do him any good, though, did it?’ the bootmaker jibed. ‘I read about that in the papers. Seems the mother of that silly girl they fished out of the river had more guts and initiative than the rest of you put together.’
‘But she killed an innocent man.’ I protested uselessly, I knew, but I was running out of things to hold his attention, and George Pound, ever edging forwards, was still a long way from being able to surprise him.
‘That’s what made it so delicious.’ The bootmaker smirked. ‘Anyway, I have enjoyed our chinwag.’ He wrenched Lucy’s head back to bare her throat. ‘Think I’m stupid?’ He sniggered at me. ‘That’s not a real gun, is it?’
The question caught me off balance. ‘Of course it is.’
But he shook his head. ‘Not from the way you’ve held it steady all this time. It’s too light.’
‘I am stronger than I look,’ I bluffed frantically, levelling it at his head. ‘Shall I pull the trigger?’
‘Go on then.’
‘Only if I have to.’
‘I can still make you a deal.’ Lucy stalled in desperation. ‘I have lots more money and I can help you. I can lure girls here or wherever you want. Who would ever suspect me? And you would not even have to leave the house.’ She writhed about and strained her bonds but the bootmaker hardly gave her a glance.
‘Shall I go first?’ He challenged me.
His eyes had a frightening chill in them now.
‘No,’ Freddy and I cried as one.
Lucy screamed.
‘No-no, I can—’ But she was beyond even knowing what she could do now, and tossing her head wildly.
The bootmaker smiled quite beautifully. ‘Farewell, my pretty one,’ he said softly, and the tip of the blade pressed just into the side of her neck.
96
The Gates of Hell
LUCY SQUEALED, BLOOD trickling down her neck.
‘Enough.’ In one smooth movement Sidney Grice leaped, swept his cane off the table and raised it to head height. He put a thumb on the lever in the handle and the cane exploded in a ball of flame. Sidney Grice cried out and clutched his face, and in that moment the gates of hell sprang open and sucked all of us in.
‘What in God’s name?’ Pound shouted, and, even in the chaos, I realized it must have been one of the sticks that Molly had put in the wash.
My guardian dropped to his knees, clawing his eyes, and I would have run to him but Lucy was thrashing, stricken with terror and pain, whimpering, the blood a steady flow now. And, behind her, the bootmaker grinned and pulled the knife free.
‘I’d say that was a misfire.’ And he looked down lovingly, as he stroked her chin and drew that long thin sliver of steel slowly and as deliberately as a surgeon making his incision.
Lucy wailed and her white skin broke and was flooded bright flowing red, and she arched back in a hopeless attempt to draw away and escape the steel which was parting her throat. And her feet flew out, running nowhere, and her wail became a gurgle and her arms strained and wrenched, and the chair rocked and the flood became a torrent, then a pulse, splattering from under her right jaw far out on to the rug where once we had sat drinking tea. It may have only taken a second, but terror stretched that time into an endless agony and snapped it back into an instant too quickly to do anything about.
‘Lucy!’ Freddy screamed.
I raced towards him and swung the barrel of my gun into his face. I aimed for his eye but he pulled back and I caught his cheek.
‘Bitch!’ He swiped the knife out of Lucy’s neck.
She was still
alive. I saw her eyes turn to look into mine, pleading for something I could not give.
The bootmaker pulled back his arm to strike, but a large shape hurtled between us and George Pound threw me backwards, almost upsetting me on to the floor.
‘Run, darling, run.’
There was a crash and I spun to see Freddy had rocked her chair over sideways and was yanking her left arm free of the broken chair and scrabbling, dragging the chair with her, towards her friend.
Sidney Grice was wiping his eye desperately with his sleeve and struggling up. ‘What is happening? March, are you all right?’
‘Yes.’
‘It is a pity you are blind.’ The bootmaker strolled over, the cheesewire dangling from his belt, a tight knot at either end. ‘I should have liked you to see me kill you.’ He pointed the gun.
I leaped at his hand but his left fist lashed out and cracked me in the mouth. My jaw jolted back against my skull. I staggered and toppled to my knees, groggy but conscious enough to see the bootmaker grin and, slowly and deliberately, pull back the hammer.
‘Who are you?’ Sidney Grice whispered huskily.
‘Who indeed?’ The bootman shrugged. ‘We are none of us who we pretend to be.’ He slipped off the safety catch, savouring every instant. ‘You want my name, Mr Grice? Well, I’m not so formal as you. Just call me Jack.’
‘Jack?’ Sidney Grice croaked.
‘Say goodbye, Mr Grice.’ The bootmaker pulled the trigger. And there was nothing. ‘What?’ He shook the revolver and tried again.
Dark Dawn Over Steep House Page 39
