The Angel Makers

by Tessa Harris

  CHAPTER 20

  Saturday, December 29, 1888

  EMILY

  Constance is not the only one who has misgivings about this man Braithwaite. Detective Sergeant Hawkins is on his case, too. He may be young and relatively inexperienced, but he can tell when a man is not what he seems. That is why, despite orders from his commanding officer, he cannot let this matter rest. The press may have been briefed that Catherine Mylett was a drunken whore and that no one else was involved in her death, but inwardly, he refuses to believe it.

  We’re back at the Commercial Street Police Station. Hawkins has just returned from another fruitless foray trying to track down Montague Druitt. As he passes the duty desk, he spots the hirsute Sergeant Halfhide. The two men swap pleasantries.

  “’Morning, Halfhide.”

  “Good morning, Hawkins.” The policeman’s bewhiskered face lifts into a smile.

  “Mrs. Halfhide well?”

  “Her rheumatism’s playing up again. This weather . . .” He looks to the heavens and shrugs to signify the inescapable drudgery of late-December wind, rain, and sleet.

  Halfhide is an H Division stalwart. He’s been stationed in Whitechapel for the last twenty years. There isn’t much that’s happened over that period that he hasn’t made it his business to know about. The veteran is held up to be a walking catalog of crime, and much more reliable than the vague and, quite frankly, shoddy record-keeping of the station these past two decades.

  Hawkins is about to return to the mayhem of his large office, which he shares with his peers, when the thought strikes him midstride. He stops and turns.

  “By the way.”

  “Yes?”

  “Does the name Braithwaite mean anything to you?”

  The older man narrows his eyes and scratches his hairy chin. “Braithwaite? Rings a bell. A Yorkshireman?” He lifts his forefinger in a gesture of promise, then lowers it to stroke his beard in thought.

  “Might we have anything on him?”

  “Let me see what I can find,” he says, touching the tip of his nose. “Leave it with me.”

  CONSTANCE

  I’ve slept bad, but then I do most nights. I’m up earlier than Flo and Ma. It’s still dark and my head’s all fuzzy, but I know it’s no use trying to get more shut-eye, so I creep downstairs and light the fire in the stove. I fill the kettle from the pail and put it on the hob. I decide I may as well make a start on breakfast and fetch the loaf from the cupboard. It’s three days old, so I scrape off the blue mold and, clamping one hand on the crusty top, begin to cut with the other. I’m so tired that as I slice, I drift off. I’m thinking about Cath and the dead baby and, of course, about poor Miss Louisa, and I’m telling myself it’s no good leaving matters in the hands of the powers that be. Miss Tindall taught me that. She used to say if you want action, then you’ve got to get up off your own arse and do it yourself—only not in such words, of course, but that was the gist of it.

  I know I can’t trust the police to investigate Cath’s death. Sergeant Hawkins means well, but I think he’s stretching himself too thin. His boss is leaning on him to find Saucy Jack, and the police seem convinced that Cath wasn’t murdered, anyway, even though a lot of them medical men say she was. My mind takes me back to that night in the George and I see Cath by my side, looking all forlorn and troubled. Grief was eating away at her, all right, like a dog gnaws a bone. But there was something else in them eyes of hers. There was . . . I picture her face: the set jaw, the resentment. There was anger—that was it. She was angry, as well as heartbroken, and that can be a dangerous mix. I look down at the blade I hold in my hand as it slices through the crust. It’s then that I recall her bending down to show me the knife she carried in her boot. Just as the thought drops into my head, the kettle’s whistle screams on the hob, startling me. The blade slips and cuts my finger.

  “Ah!” I cry. My stinging finger shoots up to my mouth and I suck away the blood.

  Next thing I know, Flo’s shouting down from the top of the stairs. “You all right, Con?”

  “Yes,” I cry, grabbing a rag and binding my finger. “Just got to nip out for a mo!”

  Snatching my shawl, I hurry through the front room and unbolt the door. I have to tell Sergeant Hawkins what I’ve just remembered.

  * * *

  I find him up a ladder in the big office. He’s putting back a book on the top shelf and seems none too happy when he looks round to see me waiting for him. He wobbles a bit and clings onto the rungs for dear life as he climbs down. It dawns on me that he don’t like heights. I can tell he’s got no head for them.

  “Ah, Miss Piper.” He’s all embarrassed. I’ve caught him in a bit of a pickle, but he manages to reach solid ground. Safely landed, he shoots me a smile; although as soon as he spies my bandaged finger, it turns to a frown.

  “Have you met with an accident?” he asks, all stiff and concerned.

  My eyes drop to the bloody rag round my digit and I shrug. “’Tis nothing,” I tell him, holding his gaze. “A cut, but it made me remember something.”

  “Something?” He motions to the chair in front of his desk.

  I sit as he bids me. “Something about the night that Cath, that Miss Mylett, died.”

  I think he might turn me away, but rather he walks to his desk, sits himself down, reaches for a pencil, and holds it poised over that notebook of his. “Yes?”

  “She had a knife.” I’ve said it. I recalled the memory of it as it flashed into my head just before I cut myself with the bread knife.

  “A knife?” repeats Sergeant Hawkins. “Why would Miss Mylett have a knife?”

  “She said you couldn’t be too careful out on the streets, and especially not with Jack about.”

  He writes something in his notebook then looks up. “And where did she keep this knife?”

  “In her boot,” I tell him. “It weren’t”—I correct myself—“it wasn’t very big, short with a wooden handle,” I add. “But I know it made her feel safer.”

  “Yet, no knife was found on her person.” The detective is frowning. He’s puzzled. I am too. “That’s interesting information,” he says, reaching for one of those boxes of his. He takes out a little card. “Here’s the inventory,” he says. I’m not sure what he’s on about, until he reads out loud a list of things that were found on Cath’s body. “‘Brown and black outer clothes. Dark tweed jacket. Lilac apron. Red flannel petticoat. Red-and-blue–striped stockings. Cash: a ha’penny.’” He eyes me. “No mention of a knife.”

  “So maybe her killer took it?” I hear myself being all eager.

  Sergeant Hawkins arches a brow. “If, indeed, the coroner finds your friend was murdered.”

  I know he’s still to be convinced. He’s wavering, but somehow I’ve got to turn him to my way of thinking. His knuckles are on his desk like he’s just about to push himself up and bid me good day. It’s then I recall my meeting with the blacksmith.

  “There’s something else, sir,” I say before he has a chance to get rid of me.

  “There is no need to call me ‘sir,’ Miss Piper.”

  I blush. Of course, he still believes me to be different from your average flower girl.

  “So?” he says, settling himself again. “This information?” His head bobs to catch my attention once more.

  I look at him straight and take a deep breath. “There’s a man, in Clarke’s Yard, where they found the body. A smithy. I reckon he knows something.”

  Sergeant Hawkins nods and I think he is almost smiling. “You’ll be a detective yet, Miss Piper,” he tells me.

  I’m puzzled. “You know about him already?”

  Another nod. “I visited Mr. Braithwaite last week. He is the man to whom you refer?”

  “Do you think he could have killed Cath?” I ask.

  “You know I can’t say.” He’s taken aback by my boldness, that’s for sure, but he softens a little. “If that had been my way of thinking he’d be behind bars by now, but he may be
able to shed more light on the incident.”

  “Shed more light?” I repeat. That’s how the quality say this Braithwaite is shifty. He seemed nervous, too, like all his feelings were bottled up inside. I pause as I dwell on my encounter, but Sergeant Hawkins’s curiosity is already touched.

  “And may I ask you what you were doing up in Clarke’s Yard, Miss Piper?”

  My face falls. I know I shouldn’t have been there. I was meddling. Laying flowers on the spot where Cath was found was only a flimsy excuse, but it’ll do. “I went to put fl . . .” But it’s no use lying to a copper who can see straight through me. He eyes me like I’m a kid.

  “I know how frustrating this must be for you, Miss Piper, but, believe me, we are doing all we can to find out what happened to your friend. I greatly appreciate your efforts on behalf of the dead infants, too, but when it comes to this sort of investigation, it would be helpful if you could leave it to the appointed authority.”

  It’s like I’ve just held out my hand and had it slapped by my teacher. I feel like a naughty schoolgirl—no, worse, a stupid dunce. Part of me thinks Sergeant Hawkins trusts my intuition, while the other knows I should keep well out of police affairs.

  “Of course. I’m sorry” is what I say.

  EMILY

  In the creeping gray of one of the coldest winter mornings of the year, Mother Delaney greets her brood. There are now four orange crates in the pantry. The contents of two of them are asleep. The third and fourth are awake but insouciant, courtesy of a good dose of tincture.

  The old woman reaches into a box and scoops up one of the babies, a girl. “Let’s be having ya,” she says cheerfully.

  There is no response. The child’s head wobbles, then flops back, without even opening her eyes. “Come now, Ethel,” she scolds. “You’ve to go to your new ma and da today.” Still, she does not waken. Mother holds her aloft, closer to her lit candle—remember, there are no windows in the pantry. Steadying the child’s lolling head with her palm, she squints at her lips. They are a strange shade of blue, but the color is familiar to her. “Come now, little Ethel. Stir yourself.” She shakes the girl, gently at first, then harder, and harder still, until she shakes her like a terrier does a rabbit. “Curse you!” she cries finally.

  Hearing her mother’s entreaties, Philomena stands at the door. When she sees the old woman throw the baby back in the box like a bag of rags, she looks resigned.

  “You want me to call Dr. Carey, Ma?” she asks.

  The old woman, her frilly cap askew after her exertion, pauses.

  “Yes. Make sure it’s him, mind, and not that other quack,” she insists. Her encounter with Dr. Greatorex has clearly unsettled her. Such procedures had been a mere formality. Now she knows she’ll have to take greater care. Dr. Carey had shown himself to be easily persuaded of the fragility of infant life in the neighborhood. She knew she could trust him to issue a death certificate without any questions asked. But she can’t take any chances with little Ethel.

  “There’s another angel in heaven today,” she says, gazing wistfully on the motionless child in the crate. “Take care of her, will you? There’s a good girl,” she tells her daughter, untying her apron strings.

  Philomena walks into the pantry, bunching her shawl around her shoulders against the cold. She leans forward and looks with sad eyes at the dead babe. She has no desire to wrap yet another little corpse in a napkin for burial, although she is finding it much easier than it used to be.

  “You off out, then, Ma?” she asks, bending low to pick up the babe.

  Her mother twitches a smile as she fastens her jacket buttons. She should be on her way to an appointment at Paddington Station, to see Bertie’s mother, but she will not keep it. Instead, she is meeting a nice young couple that wants to adopt one of her babies. She leans over the crate next to little Ethel’s, where an unusually docile child, with wisps of reddish hair, appears to be waking from a torpor.

  “Come now, Bertie, my dear,” she coos. “You’ll have to do, instead.”

  CHAPTER 21

  CONSTANCE

  It started to rain as I left the police station. By the time I reach home, it’s lashing down, whipped up by an easterly. It’s the sort of day you just want to sit by a fire and drink hot tea, but I need to be out there. I’ve told Ma and Flo I’m off to St. Paul’s area today. Only, I’m not. I’m going to Paddington Station again, and I’m running late. In my note, I told Miss Louisa I’d be there again to support her when—and if—the baby farmer gives her the address of the couple that’ve got her Bertie.

  Ma’s having a lie-in. It wouldn’t do her chest any good to be out in this weather, anyway, but I find Flo coming down the stairs looking white as a sheet.

  “You all right?” I ask.

  “I’ll live,” she replies, even though it’s clear as a shift bell at the docks she’s queasy. Next thing I know, she’s all woozy, too, like she’s been on the sauce, and she slams against the wall to stop herself from keeling over. I race over to catch her before she falls and help her into a nearby chair. Her eyes flicker up into her head and I realize she’s out cold. I rub her hands, slap her cheeks, but it’s no use. I think she’s dead.

  Oh, God! Oh no! Miss Tindall! What would Miss Tindall do? We’ve got no smelling salts, but I remember when Libby Lonergan fainted in class once, Miss Tindall sat her down and put her head between her legs so that the blood would flow back to her brain. So that’s what I do. Gently I push Flo forward so that she’s bent double and her head flops down. It does the trick. She starts to moan.

  “Oh, my Gawd!” she groans like a grumpy bear.

  “You gave me that much of a fright,” I scold, clamping my hands around hers. “Just you take it easy today.”

  “But . . . ,” she protests, jerking up.

  I still her mouth with my finger. “No but, Flo. You’ve got to get yourself better.” I ease her head down again, gentle like. I know I should call the doctor, but he’ll charge a princely sum for his services and won’t do any good, anyway. And besides, I know she don’t want to make no fuss. I bring her a blanket from upstairs and see that she’s comfy. I’d like to make a fire in the grate, but we don’t have the coal. Instead, I go to the kitchen, where there’s a fire in the stove, and brew us both a nice cup of tea. I give Flo an extra spoonful of sugar, too. I heard sweet tea is good after a faint.

  We sit in silence for a while, just listening to the sound of the rain on the windowpane. It’s like someone’s throwing handfuls of pebbles at the glass. I think Flo might drop off to sleep. I wish I could, but it’s not something that comes easy to me these days. But I’m mistaken, she was only catnapping and her voice suddenly breaks into the room.

  “You’re an angel, Con,” she says to me after a while.

  I shake my head. “I’m no angel,” I say, knowing that I’m not keeping my promise to Miss Louisa. I’m supposed to be at Paddington in less than twenty minutes, but I’ll not make it. Not now. If, as we dreaded, that old crone doesn’t come up with the address of Bertie’s new home, I’ll tell Miss Louisa to go to the police. They’ll set the Cruelty Men onto the old witch and soon put an end to her miserable trade.

  “You’ll be all right, won’t ya?” I say to Flo. It’s like I’m telling her she will. If I run and jump on the omnibus, I might just catch Miss Louisa before her train leaves for Cheltenham. From Flo, there’s no reply. She’s sleeping like a baby now.

  This time, I don’t bother with my hat. It’s still chucking it down outside, but I can’t waste a second. I put my shawl over my head and hurry out onto the street. There’s not many about, and those that are hunch over like cripples, blinking the rain out of their eyes. Collars are upturned; hats are pulled down; shawls, like mine, are over their heads. Eyes to the ground, avoiding the deep puddles, I reach the end of our row. I’m just about to turn onto the main road and I hear a faint voice. I think someone’s calling my name. Could it be Miss Tindall?

  “Miss Piper!” There it is
again.

  I look up and blink away the rain to see a lady at my side. Soaked to the skin, she is, but she don’t seem to care. She’s not even wearing a hat. It’s like she’s a ghost.

  “Miss Louisa!” I cry.

  She’s looking at me, all wan. Her hair hangs in straggles and I can’t tell the raindrops from the tears. The despair on her face moves me so much that I open my arms to hold her, feeling her wet, shivering body shudder in a sob that seems to draw the life out of her. I know it’s bad news.

  “Let’s get you inside,” I say.

  EMILY

  Less than two miles away, where the River Lea meanders through Stepney and into the Thames, the ragged watermen of Bow Creek are complaining even more than usual. They’re a surly lot at the best of times, carping about both the currents and their customers in the same breath. There’s even talk of building a tunnel under the Thames to take traffic. That’ll mean an end to their livelihoods for sure. Today, however, the driving rain is the object of their curses. Today no one in their right minds wants to be out on the river in a flimsy craft, unless they’re desperate, or up to no good, or both. Even if they were keen to take such a passage, there’s a fair chance they’d be swept farther up river, so strong is the prevailing easterly wind, so half a dozen of them are huddled around a brazier. With purple hands held out to catch the feeble heat that emanates into the chill air, they hotch from one foot to the other in an effort to trick their bodies into keeping their blood moving about their extremities. Of course, they’d rather be in the nearby Prospect of Whitby, drowning their sorrows and watching a cockfight, but they need to earn the money first.