The America Ground (The Forensic Genealogist Series Book 4)

by Nathan Dylan Goodwin

  Harriet turned to face the old hag, who nodded towards the dresser beside the bed. She ventured over and picked up a hairbrush, instantly revolted by the mop of lank, greasy strands that hung limply from it like a decaying creature. Suppressing her repulsion, Harriet quickly tugged at the hair and tossed it into the fire, watching it being instantaneously devoured by the flames.

  As Widow Elphick took her first bite of bread, Harriet began to carefully brush the woman’s hair.

  ‘Ouch!’ Widow Elphick cried with every stroke, food tumbling from her gummy mouth as she spoke. ‘You’ll have me bald as a gull be the end of lunch.’

  Reluctantly placing her free hand on the oily head in front of her, Harriet continued to brush; Widow Elphick’s lamentations, along with her partially chewed emissions subsided until she set the plate down on her lap and closed her eyes. ‘I be jawled out; leave me be,’ she instructed.

  Harriet grabbed the plate and scurried from the room, softly pulling the bedroom door shut behind her. At the top of the stairs, she closed her eyes and sighed. She knew at that moment that proving herself to be adult would be a lengthy and unpleasant process.

  Harriet blew out the reed candle, jerking the room inside the shadows. ‘Goodnight,’ she said softly.

  ‘Hattie, I don’t be sleepy yet,’ Ann whispered from the darkness.

  ‘Close your eyes and sleep be a-coming soon enough,’ Harriet replied, herself exhausted.

  From outside, the faint din of patrons hastening from the cold into the Black Horse began to filter through the shutters and Harriet wished that she were trusted enough to work there rather than to have to babysit her sisters.

  Sitting down in front of the parlour fire, Harriet picked up her sewing and stared at it. She was in the middle of hemming a silk handkerchief but had no enthusiasm to complete it. At least, not now. Not this evening. Setting down the sewing, she walked over to the parlour window and peered through the thin shutter slats. Beguiling snatches of faceless people fleeted past—shawls and coats of all colours, leather shoes and hessian boots, breeches, pantaloons and trousers—all heading towards the warmth of the Priory Ground gin palace.

  ‘Curse it,’ she uttered defiantly, as she wandered over to the stairs. She peered up into the dark silence and listened. Nothing. Although she knew that silence didn’t mean that the girls were asleep. Navigating each step judiciously so as to avoid the inevitable rasps and moans from the old wood, Harriet climbed to the top and peered into the bedroom. A mild purring rose from the bed, which Harriet knew to be emanating from Keziah. But what about Ann? Harriet wondered. She had the exasperating habit of feigning sleep. ‘Ann?’ Harriet whispered. It was a risky strategy which might result in her sleeping sister being woken by Harriet’s calling but she felt it worth the risk. When no reply came, she tried again. ‘Ann?’

  Satisfied that both of her sisters were sound asleep, Harriet stole back downstairs, put on her shawl, then pulled open the street door. Without leaving the house, she closed it again and took a step backwards into the room, where she stood in total darkness, listening. Her ears were trained, anticipating the tell-tale sounds coming from the bedroom that one of her sisters had heard the street door: the low sigh that the flock mattress emitted when one of the girls rose from it; the groan of the floorboards beneath her sisters’ feet; the barely audible clunk of the iron latch being lifted from its clasp. Nothing.

  Several minutes passed and the only noise drifting through the parlour came from the Black Horse. Convinced that she was safe to leave, Harriet stepped out into the freezing night. She gasped at the temperature and briefly considered returning inside to sit by the fire and complete her sewing. ‘Come on,’ she rebuked herself.

  She moved quickly down to the shore. The sea was calm tonight, with only the gentle slushing and dragging of shingle as the waves broke nearby. Despite the night sky’s being clear and peppered with a million tiny lights, the delicate slice of moon failed to provide sufficient light to help guide Harriet’s way; only familiarity led her safe ascension up Cuckoo Hill.

  Finally, she reached the severed hulk of the Polymina. ‘Hello? Christopher? Do you be there?’ she called tentatively but she instantly knew that she was alone on the hill; somehow there was an absence: Christopher hadn’t come again. She hadn’t seen him since the night of his mother’s accident and the nagging worry that she had hurt his feelings swelled inside her. Had she been too harsh with him? Did he no longer want to continue their illicit, but harmless meetings? It was certainly the longest they had ever gone without seeing each other. He’s probably just very busy with work and his mother, she thought, trying to convince herself that she hadn’t upset him.

  Harriet shuddered, her isolation entwining with the cold temperature, breaking through her skin and permeating into her veins. Hurrying down the hill, she had a sudden desire not to be alone and the idea of returning home, to what amounted to an empty house, disheartened her. Instead of taking the path directly back when she reached the shoreline, she took the passageway that led to the very heart of the Priory Ground’s iniquity.

  Keeping to the shadows of a tall yard wall belonging to the rope-making Breeds family, Harriet caught a glimpse of the run of tenements whose doors, so she had heard, were never shut at night. There were five cottages in all, each in a varying state of disrepair, out of which spilled unholy sounds and raucous laughter, such as Harriet had never heard before. She drew closer, spellbound by the laughter—there was something different, something false about its tone and delivery that made Harriet shudder; she was gripped and mesmerised by fear and amazement in equal measure. The street door of the second cottage was open and the ludicrous idea that she should take a peek inside presented itself to her. She rebuked herself for the ridiculous notion, yet the desire to know the extent of the rumoured vices was too strong to ignore. She knew that she should retreat back to her warm safe home and continue with her sewing like a good young lady, yet she found herself being drawn, as if attached to a pulley, towards the flickering yellow light which spilt from the open door. The immoral sounds grew louder, then suddenly stopped.

  Harriet gulped and hurriedly stepped backwards, as a man suddenly stumbled through the street door and collapsed in a heap. A silhouetted female figure subdued the light. ‘Git out, before I summons the watchmen and has you taken off to gaol.’

  ‘I gived you three shillings, Miss Rutherford!’ he growled, as he rolled about on the floor. ‘I be wanting more than that.’

  Miss Rutherford, a name which Harriet had heard mentioned only in hushed whispers, disappeared inside the house and drew the street door shut, taking the light with her. The clanking of a bolt inside the house told Harriet that this particular house of ill fame had closed for the night; she suddenly felt alone.

  ‘Filthy old draggle-tail!’ the man shouted, unable to make his feet hold his body weight.

  Harriet, with her eyes fixed on the drunken man, tugged her shawl tight to her chin and began to step backwards. The absolute stupidity of her decision to venture to these parts crystallised in her mind when the man finally found his feet and began lurching in her direction; the passageway was so narrow that there was no way that she could avoid detection. She gasped and increased the speed of her backward steps.

  ‘Who be there?’ the man slurred.

  Turning to run, Harriet twisted awkwardly and her foot slipped; she crashed down onto the damp shingle below. Wasting no time in looking back, she rose and turned in the direction of home. As she set her first foot down to run, a hefty hand landed on her right shoulder and she yelped as meaty fingers pressed down under her collar bone.

  ‘Where you be a-going then, young girl?’ the toothless man grunted, his foul alcohol-infused breath blustering at Harriet’s face.

  ‘Home,’ Harriet cried. ‘I be going home, now let me go!’ She writhed and wriggled, but his grip was too powerful.

  ‘What be the hurry?’ the man smirked, tugging open her shawl with his free hand.
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br />   Harriet screamed and in an instant, his heavy labourer’s hand smacked down onto her mouth with such a force as to slam her whole body backwards into the brick wall. The loudest shriek she could muster was lost under the clamping weight of the hand crushing down over her mouth. With the bitter taste of warm blood from her own lips running into her mouth and the foul stench of her assailant’s breath stinging her nose, Harriet knew what was about to happen; groping fingers began to run up her thigh, tearing and snagging at any clothing that dared to defy their path. She strained to look into his eyes, to see and understand the man who was now only moments away from her most intimate parts, but all the pallid moon offered her was a lumbering black shape steeped in liquor, which had undoubtedly been provided by her own parents.

  She wriggled frantically, but his grip only tightened.

  She tried to kick out, but he pressed his body firmly into hers, so that the odour from his breath was matched by the odour from his unwashed body.

  The man wheezed and snorted, mocking her resistance but continued undeterred.

  Harriet squirmed and thrashed but knew that she was entirely powerless to stop the inevitable.

  Chapter Six

  Morton’s study resembled a miniature library; every inch of wall space was occupied with shelves and cabinets supporting books, files and journals on almost every subject. All that is except for one wall, which was used, rather like a police incident room, for the attaching of evidence from his genealogical investigations. Morton had unstuck and shifted the slim research into his biological father, to make an area available to the Lovekin Case. In the centre of the wall was now a copy of Eliza’s painted portrait. On yellow Post-it notes below the picture was written: ‘born c.1786, buried 1 May 1827 St Clements Church. Murdered.’ From Eliza’s picture flowed several pieces of coloured string, the terminus of each being notes and printouts that Morton had so far unearthed. As he looked at the wall he wondered if Eliza being murdered was a good thing or a bad thing to be able to add to her provenance. Did it make the painting more valuable? he pondered. Or more saleable? He wasn’t sure he would want a random painting of a murdered woman hanging in his house.

  He looked at the date of Eliza’s burial and returned to the same curious coincidence that he had first spotted yesterday: that just one week after obtaining the freehold entitlement to a tract of land on the America Ground, Eliza was murdered. From past experience, Morton found that such coincidences were rarely the remarkable concurrence of unrelated events that they might have first appeared to have been. His genealogical instinct told him that something was amiss. Perhaps the current owners of the land could shed some light.

  Opening up a web browser, Morton typed ‘Riccards-Maloney’ into Google. He clicked on the first result, which linked to the company’s website. Below their name and the location of their offices (London, Sydney, New York) was a revolving picture gallery showing an impressive array of properties and a mission statement which read: Riccards-Maloney is an independent property and land development company, with experience of building and refurbishing properties for the commercial and residential sectors for over thirty-five years. Morton located the ‘Contact us’ button from the drop-down menu and composed an email to them, relaying the basic outline of the case so far and requesting any information that they could offer on the freehold entitlement currently in his possession. Having read it through carefully, he clicked ‘send’.

  Since Joseph and Eliza had died just a month apart, Morton wanted to know—assuming that they were a couple—if there were any surviving children who stood to inherit from them. Running a search in the National Archives’ online wills and probate index produced no results.

  He looked down at his notepad where the next steps in his research were written, but there seemed little point in pursuing the case if the information that he had already obtained was sufficient for his client. He looked up a phone number for Bunny’s shop and dialled.

  ‘Hello, Bunny’s Emporium, Madge speaking.’

  Morton felt his insides wilt. Madge. Why did she have to be the one to answer? In a fleeting moment of desperation he actually considered disguising his voice or hanging up altogether.

  ‘Hello? Is there anyone there?’ Madge asked.

  ‘Oh, hello, Madge,’ he finally answered, in his best attempt at sincerity. ‘It’s Morton here. I was just phoning to speak to Bunny.’

  ‘Morton—how lovely! How are you today?’ she asked brightly—a little too brightly for his liking. There had been no contact between them since the very uncomfortable meal two nights ago when the wedding bombshell had been detonated.

  ‘Yes, fine, thank you,’ he answered, wincing as he added, ‘How are you?’

  ‘Not too bad,’ she said, before lowering her voice. ‘Sorry about the other night—you know, with your father being like he was. You know what he can be like.’

  Morton mumbled his agreement; he knew exactly what his father could be like.

  ‘It’s just…’ Madge began. ‘It’s this American chap…I mean…do you really need to be doing what you are doing? It’s a different time…different people…I don’t understand why you’re…why you would want to do this.’

  A sudden flurry of bilious anger swelled inside Morton. How dare she? He knew that he had ambushed his father somewhat, but she had absolutely no place to dictate anything to him. Having taken so long to even consider pursuing his own ancestry, he was now on an unstoppable journey to find his biological father and nobody was going to stand in his way. And definitely not Madge.

  ‘Are you still there, Morton?’ she pushed.

  ‘Yes, I’m still here,’ he answered sourly. He breathed deeply, swallowing down the rancour that he felt lining his throat. ‘Is Bunny there? I need to talk to her about Eliza Lovekin.’

  ‘Have you found the murderer yet?’ Madge asked.

  Really? Morton thought. After two days? ‘No, not quite. Is Bunny there? I need to know how much more research she wants me to undertake. Bearing in mind she’s paying for my time.’

  ‘Well I hope you find him,’ Madge continued. ‘She looked so beautiful in that painting, it doesn’t bear thinking about that someone actually killed her.’

  A gap in the conversation gave Morton time to calm down.

  ‘I’m sure she’ll want you to carry on with your work. I’ll get her to give you a ring when she gets back—she’s running some furniture to a customer at the moment.’

  ‘Okay, thanks. Bye,’ Morton said, hurriedly ending the call.

  Still feeling agitated, he wandered over to the window and threw it wide open, enjoying the chilly morning air filling his lungs. He looked down at the thronged Mermaid Street below, his eyes drifting aimlessly over the crowds of people, as he consciously tried to disconnect himself from the conversation that he had just endured with his father’s fiancée. Part of his resentment, he knew, came from the very fact that his father was marrying again. It didn’t matter how many times he was told (by Juliette or by himself) that his mother had been gone a long time and that his father deserved to be happy, still the feelings burned in him. The idea of attending their wedding made him feel nauseous and had left him resenting his own wedding planning, avoiding it whenever Juliette raised the issue.

  ‘Snap out of it,’ he told himself, closing the window and returning to his desk. But it was no use, he was clenched and not in the right frame of mind to be staring at a computer screen. He looked down at his notepad and settled on what to do next: pay a visit to St Clements Church in Hastings Old Town.

  Finding the graves of the deceased involved in Morton’s investigations had always been a haphazard undertaking with mixed results. Oftentimes, a lengthy search of a cemetery or churchyard would result in finding that the person had been buried in an unmarked common grave with no new evidence to glean for his case. However, it was an avenue that had also sometimes yielded amazing results and could not be ignored. It was this dichotomy that ran through Morton’s mind as he stared
at the graveyard of St Clements Church. The large ancient building was surrounded on all sides by a narrow strip of grass and a stone wall; not one gravestone was to be found within its boundaries. It wasn’t until he was at the rear of the church that he spotted it: a collection of gravestones tucked away behind a spiked black iron fence, separated from the church by a passageway with quaint cottages. The headstones stood defiantly against an invasive mixture of holly, rhododendrons, stinging nettles, wild roses and great swathes of ivy that had made admirable efforts to consume the entire yard. He found the gate rusting and locked by a heavy-duty padlock. He rattled the gate but it held firm against his grip. Morton stepped back to take in a wider view of the ground, looking carefully for any gaps in the fence, but there were none. He considered knocking at the doors of two properties—one a small cottage and one a pre-school playgroup—that bordered the graveyard but, on closer inspection could see that neither had access; the sole entry point was through the locked gate. Surely there’s a phone number for someone with a key? Morton thought, growing increasingly frustrated, struggling to catch glimpses of surnames through the railings. Philpott…Barnes…Dibdin…Lavender was that? It was useless—he needed to get inside.

  In a frustrated march, Morton headed down Church Passage and looped back around to the front of the church. On the noticeboard was a contact number for the vicar in charge. He dialled the number and waited. Morton listened as the phone rang endlessly. No answer. No answerphone. He continued to hold his mobile to his ear as he strode back towards the graveyard. Only when he reached the gate once more did he finally terminate the call.

  ‘Great stuff,’ he mumbled sarcastically, as he reassessed the situation. ‘I’m about to be impaled. Brilliant.’

  Studying the fence and gate, he realised that the only place where he could get a foothold was on a horizontal spine that ran just below the lock. He leant over and set his bag down on the other side, took a quick glance around him to ensure that he was alone, then placed one foot on the bar and heaved himself up. He exhaled sharply when he hoisted his right leg over the gate and looked down to see the run of iron spikes just inches from his groin. Testing his foothold very carefully, he lifted his left leg over, then dropped down the other side. He picked up his bag with a grin and began to systematically check each headstone.