The Death of Me

by M. J. Tjia

  It takes more than a minute for her breathing to slow down. She pulls her knees up to her body. She wants to curl up as small as possible, be invisible, in case the couple come searching for her. The woods seem extensive though; it would be difficult for them to know where to start. And if they do come looking for her this night, Amah’s sure she will see their approach by the light of their lamps which will, she fervently hopes, give her time to scramble away and find another hiding spot.

  Amah’s not sure how much longer the black night will conceal her. She’s uncertain as to whether there are several hours available to her in which she can hobble to a safe haven, or only an hour or two until the pale dawn reveals her whereabouts. She rotates her aching ankle and then places her foot flat on the ground and pushes, as though to stand, but a sharp pang spirals up her calf and she collapses back again. Her body is taut with pain, and she has to will herself to relax. She will rest a short while. And then she will manage somehow to climb to her feet and hop her way out of the woods, if need be.

  She is almost dozing, the tips of her nose, her feet, her hands cooling with the night air, when a noise, distant and muffled at first, moves closer, becomes clearer. Footsteps. Treading through the brushwood, crushing dry leaves. But she’s almost certain the footsteps are not coming from the direction of the house in which she was held captive. She stares to her left, her eyes straining against the blinding darkness. Scraping the palms of her hands against the rough bark of the tree trunk, she tries to pull herself to her feet, but her hand slips and she jerks to the ground again. The steps come closer. She can’t be sure how close because her heartbeat crashes in her ears. She grunts with fright when something – pale, with raised hand, like that spectre, the spectre of her childhood – lurches out from the forest’s gloom and descends upon where she crouches.

  CHAPTER 25

  I lie back on the hard mattress and my eyes take in how the moonlight pools through the glass doors into my dingy room, touching its ghostly fingers to the chest of drawers, my portmanteau, my little boots that I’ve kicked off in the middle of the floor, the dark timber of my bed’s footboard. A strong wind has picked up, rattling the doors, making the terrace railings creak. I wouldn’t be surprised if one day soon – tonight perhaps – the whole thing falls to the ground in one loud, deadly crash, wrenched from the front of the house like a crusty carbuncle. In the grate, orange flames, tapered and weak, lick hungrily at the black edges of two pieces of coal. The sudsy aftertaste of yet more herrings for supper lines my mouth, despite a good scrubbing with my toothbrush.

  Instead of donning my nightdress, I’ve changed from my picnicking gown – still damp and muddy about the edges – into the one I wore earlier in the day, and although I haven’t worn a crinoline since arriving in Soho, my thick petticoats and skirt flow over the side of the narrow bed. It is not only because I know I will find no sleep that I remain attired in a morning gown, but also because I want to be ready if anything should happen. I want to be prepared to leap into action.

  I know why I keep an eye on the terrace doors. They have troubled my sleep each night I have spent here. Although not made of sturdy stuff, that terrace would be easy enough for a strong man – or robust child, actually – to swing himself onto. And although I think, if someone were to spy on me or try to break into my room in such a way, that they would surely fall through the splintered flooring or topple the whole structure, I can’t help but watch.

  My heart jumps as the doors shake again, the strong gust of wind whistling through the cracks. The firelight leaps for a second, then returns to a low crackle. Truth be told I have often wondered if whoever tried to kill me in Paris would find me in such a way, finish off what he couldn’t in Paris. Somehow jemmy the terrace door open when I sleep, slip across the floor, slide the keen edge of a knife across my throat. I reach across for my reticule and hug it to my side. My fingers trace the hard outline of my pistol.

  If you’d asked me the day before, my money would have been on Ripley as that fellow. But now I am not so sure. That whole defence lesson rigmarole. What was that about? And he hinted that he was the one who pushed me out of the way of that careening carriage. It was a hint, wasn’t it? In my letter to Mrs White tonight, I wrote everything I could remember of Connolly and what Ripley told me of the Fenians. RB. Instead of sending the letter through normal channels, I paid the barber’s boy to run it straight to Pall Mall. Surely this is the break they are searching for. Hopefully they will halt whatever disaster is in store for tomorrow.

  From the corner of my eye I see a shift in the gloom. I turn my head, the rest of my body tense. I peer towards the door that leads from the hallway into my rooms, and I catch the slightest movement in the darkness. As though the brass door handle is being turned. I know the door is locked, though, and the key lies on the chest of drawers. But perhaps there is another – of course there must be another! – and my heart thrums so hard I press the palm of my hand to my breast-bone. I stare and stare. Nothing. The handle remains still. My eyes fly to the inch-wide gap at the bottom of the bedroom door, and the shadows there seem to me to be irregular. Two black shapes, like feet, wait on the other side of the door. Someone listening, in the darkness, for me.

  I must be imagining it. But I watch until my eyes dry, film over, and I have to blink. When I re-focus, the shadow under the door is uniform again. No black shapes. I wait, my heart pounding so loud I’m surprised I can hear the stair creak or the moth that flutters its way across the ceiling. Rain falls so forcefully the iron railings seem to hum with the pressure. Finally, I sit up, wincing at the hollow groan of the bed’s frame. I tiptoe to the second room and bring the desk chair out. I pause in the middle of the floor, clutching the chair to my chest like a weapon. Perhaps whoever waits has not left at all. Perhaps they linger to the side of the door. Ready to burst in. Pounce.

  Regardless of the loud scraping sound it makes, I jam the back of the chair beneath the door handle. Wedge the damn thing in place.

  And then it occurs to me afresh: if Ripley didn’t try to murder me in Paris, who did?

  CHAPTER 26

  AMAH

  “Madam,” a low, male voice says to her. He drops to a knee beside her. “What are you doing out here so late in the evening?”

  His voice. Something about his voice stops Amah short. John? Could it be her John? She knows it can’t be so, is sure it can’t be so, but her heart smarts to hear this voice so like his.

  A match flares and the man lights a small lantern. He holds it between them, and she can see that he is young – early twenties, perhaps – and his hair is dark, his eyes blue, unlike John, who was fair with eyes the colour of an overcast sky.

  “Please. You must help,” she says to him. “They might come for me.” She peers into the darkness behind.

  “Who will come after you?”

  “I don’t know their names. A young couple. In a house through the woods. They’ve held me captive these last few days.”

  The young man takes in Amah’s face, her unkempt hair. A light frown puckers his brow. “Come, take my hand and I will assist you.” He holds his hand out to her. “My name is Christopher. I live nearby.”

  “I’m afraid I’ve twisted my ankle,” she says.

  Christopher hauls her to her feet, where Amah gingerly tests her foot against the ground. By the light of the lantern, Christopher searches for Amah’s slippers and helps her slide them on.

  “This way,” he says, gesturing in the direction from which he came. “It was lucky I decided upon a walk tonight, or you might have frozen, I feel.”

  “Are we on your land?”

  “We are indeed. Know these woods like the back of my hand. Been scouring them since I was a young lad. I often go for a walk of an evening like this when I’ve had nothing more to do than read the news and stare into the fire.” His stride is unhurried, so that Amah can keep up.

  “Where are we?”

  Christopher pauses for a moment, looking down a
t her. “You don’t know where we are?”

  Amah shakes her head. “I’m afraid I was brought here against my will.”

  “You must tell me of it as soon as you are recovered,” he says, adding, “You’ll find we are near the township of Eccleston, madam.”

  Not terribly far from the Liverpool harbour then. Amah is familiar with the area despite never having visited before. They continue on their slow way. Amah’s fingers clutch the young man’s twill sleeve as she limps along.

  “And tell me, just what time is it?” she asks.

  “Close on midnight, I should think. I say, would you like me to carry you?”

  Amah shakes her head, ‘No, thank you,” she says even though she has to grit her teeth against the ache in her ankle. But she much prefers the pain to the indignity – the uncomfortable intimacy – of being lifted into this young man’s arms.

  At their sluggish pace, it’s a good half an hour before they set foot on a neat, pebbled driveway, pale against its verdant surrounds, that leads to a sprawling manor house.

  “This is my home. Crewe Hall,” Christopher says.

  Amah halts, her hand falling from the young man’s arm. “Crewe?”

  “Yes. I am Sir Christopher Crewe.” He sounds a little pompous, but then, by the light of the moon Amah sees a glimpse of his teeth when he grins. “Still not used to saying it, to be honest. Not so long ago when my poor old pater passed away.”

  But Amah doesn’t ask. Won’t ask. Keeps walking, listening to the crunch of their footsteps as they follow the driveway.

  “Describe this pair to me,” Christopher asks her.

  He’s ensconced her in a soft armchair by the fire and wrapped a blanket about her shoulders. The housekeeper – sniffing with disapproval – has brought her tea, and Amah’s fingers are curled thankfully about the teacup’s heat. But she’s not wholly relaxed. Her eyes dart to the row of four windows that extend from ceiling to floor. She’s worried her kidnappers might burst in through them and whisk her away to that dark cellar again.

  “The man was perhaps of five and thirty years. Sharp features, you know, almost like a rodent. I heard the woman call him Joshua a number of times. She was much younger than he, and quite pretty. Very large eyes. I don’t know what her name was.”

  Christopher takes a seat across from her and his gaze is solemn. “Why were they holding you against your will, do you think?”

  By the tender light of the fire, Amah can see it now. The lines of his jaw; something about the hair that curls onto his temple. “You’re John’s boy, aren’t you? Jonathan Crewe.”

  Christopher’s eyebrow lifts, but he doesn’t look terribly surprised. He nods. “I am. And I believe that perhaps – before my time, before he married my mother – my father knew you. Knew you quite well.” His voice is gentle, understanding almost. She has to look away, blinks as she stares into the fireplace.

  She allows bitterness to snuff the hurt. “Yes. We did know each other quite well.” Her eyes find his. “But how do you know of this?”

  He leans back in his chair. “I wasn’t of age when he died, so my uncle took control of the estate. It was only a year ago that I gained access to all my father’s papers. I found a modest annuity, made out to a Li Leen Chan, that my father had organised after my younger sister was born.”

  Amah thinks of that long ago visit from the lawyer, Mr Villin, one afternoon when she was feeding Heloise a supper, yet again, of bread soaked in a little milk, and how he told her of the allowance she was to receive from an anonymous source. Amah has always wondered, suspected even, that the money was from John, and as much as she would have liked to toss it back into his fainthearted face, she was thankful. It allowed for them to move away from the docks, from the house on Henderson Street that had become increasingly slovenly with each year. In a bid to prise Heloise away from the Walters’ girl and the Liverpool back-alleys, Amah moved as far as the first instalment of money could take her, to Chester. But Heloise never did settle. Hated the school Amah enrolled her into, hated the staid town with its neat, quaint buildings.

  “I also found a single earring and this…” Christopher stands and makes his way to a side board. He takes an envelope from the top drawer and hands it to Amah. Her mouth drops open as she slides out a photograph of Heloise, of when she was perhaps eleven, twelve years old. She is dressed for school and her smile is coy, secretive as she peers into the camera’s lens. Amah has never seen the photo before.

  “This is very odd,” she says. “This likeness was taken several years after we last saw your father. I really don’t know how he came to have it.” That little scamp, Heloise. Amah never did know what she was up to, but she readily believed that the girl willingly posed for the stranger’s photograph in exchange for what? Ribbon, a silk handkerchief, money?

  “But the earring is missing,” Christopher says.

  Amah nods. “The dreadful couple who kept me imprisoned have it. I think they had the idea that they could blackmail you in some way with it, with the knowledge of who it came from.”

  Christopher shakes his head. “My careless sister and her wastrel of a husband, no less. I suspect they kept you captive in the old dowager’s house, which is located on the other side of the woods. My foreman mentioned to me that he thought he saw smoke coming from the chimneys there yesterday.” He sighs. “My sister and her husband are always trying to come up with ways of making money out of me. They must assume I have no idea of your existence.”

  “How did they track me down? They obviously found the earring… but then?”

  “We still have the records of where the annuity was sent. The trail leads from Liverpool to Chester to London.”

  To South Street. Amah nods. Thinks of how the money helped pay for that house in Bloomsbury.

  “My sister, Lilian.” Christopher shakes his head again. “I’m afraid Father spoilt her too much. She’s run through her own inheritance, her husband’s riches and now is bent upon tapping into what is left of mine.”

  “Her name is Lilian?”

  “Yes. Father named her. After you, I suspect.”

  Amah takes a moment to digest this. Li Leen. Lilian. The young woman was named after her? She gives a huff of laughter at the thought.

  “He must have been very fond of you, madam,” Christopher says.

  Amah stares into the fire again.

  “He must have been. He told me of you once, you know. He was pretty far gone on a bottle and a half of claret, not long after my mama died. He talked of our duty to this estate, of carrying on the line and so forth. That’s when he mentioned a lost love and how he inherited all of this quite unexpectedly. His uncle and three cousins had died in a scarlet fever outbreak. He was terribly glum when he spoke of the difficult decision he had found before him: whether to take on the responsibility of this baronetcy or to continue on with his happy, simple life.”

  Difficult? It shouldn’t have been a difficult decision. How could he desert their sunny child with the dimple in her cheek? How could he leave Amah’s arms, when her skin was still fragrant and soft? Christopher is not helping his father’s case. It makes Amah sad to remember John as a weak man, but there it is.

  Christopher leans forward. “Forgive me, but I feel I should ask… this girl… ” he nods towards the photograph. “She’s my half-sister, isn’t she? My father’s illegitimate child?”

  Amah’s eyes narrow as she contemplates him. A coolness settles over her. She could be fond of this boy, with his kind eyes like his father’s, his sympathetic smile. But how could that ever be so?

  She thinks back to a blustery day, when the wind tried to whip the bonnet from her head, its force like a hand in the middle of her back, propelling her towards the docks. John wore a white carnation pinned to his cravat for the occasion, and Amah carried a single lily. The chapel was poky, used sporadically by returned sailors and those far from home, and the vicar had deep lines etched into his face, a map of his seafaring days.

 
Heloise is many things, but illegitimate is not one of them.

  CHAPTER 27

  My eyelids flicker against the grey dawn that filters into my room. I had spent most of the evening so rigid with anxiety, it felt as though my bones fused together as I lay in my bed; I thought the rhythm of my heart would race for evermore. Again and again I ran through the possible culprits, the possible scenarios. The Italians, the factory workers, those Fenians of Ripley’s. And what did they have planned? My ideas of what might happen on the morrow started out whole, as rounded and awful as a scene in a play. As the night deepened, the images fragmented and intersected, like the jagged pieces of a smashed mirror. And somehow, amidst my waking nightmares, I must have fallen asleep.

  Closing my eyes again, I succumb to the heaviness of my mind, my limbs; I feel sleep’s gentle shroud settle over my skin, my ears, my face, deep, deep, the morning light almost extinguished, when a terrible wail heaves me fully awake. I sit up, listening for a repeat of the terrible noise. But all I hear is a high-pitched chattering, the sound of a man shouting.

  Hurrying over to the terrace doors, I look out and spy the organ grinder sprawled across the dirty cobblestones of the court, his monkey hopping about his head, screeching and clutching his little captain’s hat. Mr Modesto comes into view, and he dashes the barrel organ to the ground, a mangled confusion of wood and twisted wheel, so that it wheezes out that horrible, rising wail that woke me up. The organ grinder scuttles to his knees, his feet, grabbing hold of the organ by its handle, dragging the broken machine across the ground behind him as he runs. The monkey chases, catching onto the organ grinder’s coat tails, climbing up his back until he can clasp his tiny hands around the man’s neck.

  What was all that about? I watch for a few moments more. Two natty shop assistants stand outside the umbrella shop, looking the organ grinder up and down as he rounds the corner and disappears from sight, closely pursued by a gang of three young lads in tattered breeches, who look like they might cheerfully take up where Modesto left off. The tobacconist’s wife calls over her shoulder to someone within the shop, before shrugging and turning back inside.