Music Macabre

by Sarah Rayne

  ‘I heard something.’

  ‘What?’

  Daisy turned her head, and looked back down the tunnel, to where a faint light came from the open gate. Then, in a voice from which most of the breath had been driven, she said, ‘Joe, there’s someone in the tunnel with us.’

  She felt him flinch, but then he said, ‘It’ll be the police come back. Bit sooner than we thought.’

  ‘They’d have made more noise – boots and calling to one another.’

  ‘I can’t hear anything,’ said Joe. ‘There’s no one here.’

  But as he said this, a sly, soft voice reached them.

  ‘Oh, but, my dears, there is someone here with you.’ The throaty whisper echoed horridly in the enclosed space. ‘Did you really think I’d let you get away from me?’ said the voice. ‘The two people in the world who could identify me … Who still could identify me and get me hanged. The two who saw what I did on one of those nights.’

  He was coming towards them now – in the light from the lantern his shadow was already on the far wall and the tunnel roof, monstrous and distorted. The hands were already reaching out, and Daisy had to beat down the impulse to run, because even with the lantern’s light it would be so easy to stumble and fall into the channel. But Joe had grabbed her hand, and was already pulling her away from the menacing shadow. And if they could find their way to the grating with the iron ladder – the ladder he had climbed down before …

  ‘You won’t escape,’ said the voice. ‘I can’t let you live, of course – you know what I look like. You’ll give the police that last piece of evidence they need to hang me. They never had that, you know – or did you know? They weren’t able to prove anything against me – that’s why they put me in that place: The Thrawl. They couldn’t put me on trial, but they didn’t dare let me go free. They knew what I’d do if they did.’

  ‘You’d go on murdering,’ whispered Daisy. We’re hearing his confession, she thought, her mind tumbling. He’s telling us what happened, what he did, why he was locked away in The Thrawl. And once he’s finished telling us that …

  He was much nearer to them now, even though they were moving as fast as they dared. But the shadows were shivering, because Joe was shaking with terror, making the lantern shake as well. The shadows on the tunnel walls and the roof were becoming fantastical, unreal outlines.

  The massive black shadow suddenly swooped forward, and Daisy cried out. In the lantern’s beam, the remembered face came out of the gloom, and with it was the glint of something sharp and pointed – something that would tear and maim and torture … Something he must have stolen – a knife, a razor … It did not matter; all that mattered was escaping him.

  Then Joe’s arm came up, and a spear of light seemed to fly like a burning arrow through the darkness. Daisy gasped, then realized that Joe had flung the oil lamp straight into the face of the murderer. It struck him full on, and he let out a screech of pain and terror, flinging up his hands in defence. But already a small flame had shot up from the lamp where the oil had spilled out on to the candle and the wick, and fire blazed up. The flames licked across the wet stone walls, but although it found no hold there, it continued to rage upwards. As the hot smell of burning oil gusted out, Daisy and Joe recoiled, throwing up their own hands to shield their faces and their eyes from the flames, backing away.

  And then the screaming began.

  It filled up the tunnel, splintering the brooding silence of the ghost river. Against the flames, sharply limned, was the struggling black figure, the arms flung up as if for help. But there was nothing Daisy or Joe could do to save him – they could only save themselves; they could only try to get away from the burning shape and out of the sound of the screams that must be tearing his throat to bloodied tatters …

  They half ran, sobbing and gasping, along the tunnel, until finally and blessedly they saw faint spears of daylight filtering in from overhead – light that showed them the iron rungs of the ladder that would take them up to the street.

  As they went towards it, behind them, the man London had known as Jack the Ripper screamed as he burned alive in the ghost river.

  St Martin-in-the-Fields was chiming six as they made their exhausted way through the streets, and people were around, and there was a strange air of normality everywhere, because for a great many people another ordinary day had begun.

  ‘Maida Vale first,’ said Daisy. ‘I think I’ve got enough to pay a cab, and if I haven’t, Rhun or the Thumbprints will pay when we get there.’

  ‘Do we tell people about … about what’s just happened?’

  ‘I don’t know. We’ll tell Rhun and see.’

  ‘What’s going to happen to Madame?’ said Joe.

  Daisy looked at him in the grey dawn of the London street.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said.

  TWENTY-NINE

  Phin came up out of a confused nightmare, in which pain had been clenching around his head in throbbing waves. Deep within the nightmare was something about a huge gate clanking down.

  He fought against the pain, and forced himself to think what had led to this. He could remember setting off for Linklighters to meet Loretta Farrant – that had only been this morning, hadn’t it? He remembered, as well, that he had been a bit early, but that the restaurant door had been unlocked, so he had gone inside, and then down to the deep cellar. He frowned, feeling the confusion clear slightly. The panel leading to the old Cock & Pye ditch had been open and, incredibly, what had to be a sluice gate was being cranked down. Phin had barely had time to take this in, when he’d realized there was someone beyond the gate – someone inside the dark tunnel, who looked injured. Phin had instinctively gone towards the huddled-up figure, and that had been when a pair of small, strong hands had pushed him, so hard that he had tumbled through the narrowing gap between the edge of the gate and the ground. He thought he had banged his head against something hard and cold, but as he spun down into unconsciousness, he knew he had heard the sound of the gate clanging down into place.

  His head was still banging with maddeningly rhythmic waves of pain, but the pain was starting to recede slightly, and Phin tried to see about him. The darkness was thick, but it was not absolutely complete – or perhaps his eyes were adjusting. There was the impression of someone sitting quite near to him. He had just acknowledged this, and he was just realizing it must be whoever he had seen earlier, when a voice said, a bit breathlessly, ‘You’ve come round? Thank God for that, at any rate. Are you all right?’

  ‘I think so. Who—’

  ‘Roland Farrant,’ said the voice. ‘You must be Phineas Fox.’

  ‘Yes.’ Phin managed to add, ‘As introductions go, this has to be the weirdest ever. What happened?’

  There was a considerable pause, as if Roland Farrant was working out what to say. Probably, though, he was in pain. He had certainly sounded as if he was.

  ‘I’m not entirely sure. We were testing the sluice gate – there’s an insurance inspection due. The mechanism jammed and I think Loretta panicked.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Phin. ‘I thought she pushed me through.’

  ‘I don’t think so. No, she wouldn’t do that. She was trying to reach up to unjam the gate,’ said Roland, then broke off on a gasp.

  ‘Are you injured?’ Phin thought they could both be fairly sure that Loretta had pushed him, and he thought it was likely she had done the same to Roland, although he could not imagine why. But that was not the immediate concern. He managed to half sit up, which made his head spin again, but made him feel a bit more in control of the situation.

  ‘I think I’ve got a broken rib,’ said Roland. ‘I crunched it against the edge of the wall. It’s as painful as hell, but I don’t think there’s any more damage. Have you got a phone? Mine’s on the other side of that hellish gate.’

  ‘Yes, hold on … Damn,’ said Phin, after a moment. ‘No signal. I suppose we’re too far underground. Wait a minute, I’ll put the torch on – at least we�
�ll have a bit of light. Can we open the gate from this side?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ said Roland. ‘I think this whole place was sealed up years ago.’

  ‘We’d better try, though. Until,’ said Phin, carefully, ‘help comes.’

  He made a cautious way to the gate. The ledge was perilously narrow – it would be easy to make a misstep and fall into the yawning channel where the old ditch had been. He got to the gate, although when he shone the phone’s torchlight all around it, he saw it was flush with the wall, and metal plates overlaid the entire frame. There was no switch, no lever, nothing to operate it. Phin, wishing his head was not aching so violently, examined the entire wall again, then returned to where Roland half lay.

  ‘Nothing doing, I’m afraid.’

  Roland, clearly still struggling against pain, said, ‘I didn’t think there would be. The tunnel was closed off – oh, years and years ago. Loretta found out about it, because there were all kinds of Health and Safety regulations she had to comply with. She had to make sure that the place could be accessed and that’s why that panel was built in.’

  Phin felt despair close over him. He thought it seemed unlikely that Loretta would get them out; as for shouting, they could shout until they were voiceless, but they would never be heard down here. Toby certainly knew Phin had the meeting with Loretta, but there was no reason for him to wonder where Phin was. But there would be a way to get out – Phin would concentrate on how to do it, and he would not think that he had been lured down here by Loretta Farrant. In any case, he had not been lured at all; he had instigated today’s meeting himself.

  Lured. The word scratched against his mind. He frowned, then memory clicked into place. The old verse from the Marble Arch pub had been about London’s old rivers – hadn’t it even mentioned this one? It had certainly talked about luring, though; Phin forced his mind to yield up the exact words. There had been something about only sleeping in beds where you were safe, and about never letting yourself be lured to a ghost river bed, because you could end up dead. The verse slid into his mind.

  ‘Never be lured to the ghost river beds,

  Only sleep in a bed where you’re safe.

  In a ghost river bed, you could end up quite dead …’

  Then had come the quirky mentions of the old, lost London rivers. Tyburn and the Earl’s Sluice. And this one, of course. The Cock and Pye.

  ‘And there’s really no use

  To try raising the sluice.

  Street grids and street grilles will not help your ills,

  For you can’t reach the grilles when you’re dead.’

  Grilles, thought Phin, sitting up, and wincing from the jab of pain against his temples. Street grids and street grilles. That verse was saying there would be street grids or grilles along those old rivers.

  Would there still be grilles from this river that opened on to the streets? For drainage? For maintenance? Phin thought there would have to be, and he had a sudden vivid memory of walking across Harlequin Court with Arabella, and of Arabella getting the heel of her boot stuck in a grille. Was that grille directly over the Cock & Pye? But it did not have to be that one – any grille would do. Because if they could find one, and even if they could not climb through, they could use it to attract attention. They would probably be able to get a phone signal, too.

  Phin got to his feet again.

  ‘Roland – can you walk?’

  ‘Just about. If I have to.’

  ‘This might not work out, but we’ve got to go along this tunnel until we see light coming in from overhead.’

  ‘Loretta said the ditch came out somewhere in St Martin’s Lane,’ said Roland. ‘But it’s anybody’s guess if it still does. And she said the whole tunnel had been sealed. Wouldn’t that mean any grids would have been covered over?’

  ‘Let’s hope not,’ said Phin.

  It was eerie and it was perilous in the extreme to make their way along the narrow ledge. Phin was still fighting the dizziness from having hit his head against the tunnel wall, and Roland was clearly in a good deal of pain from his cracked – or broken – rib. But it had to be done. If they crawled on their hands and feet, they had to find a way of reaching the streets above.

  Phin shone the torchlight carefully, praying the charge would last. Several layers below those thoughts, he tried not to think that there would almost certainly be rats down here.

  Their footsteps echoed in the enclosed space, and once, when Roland stumbled and sent a shower of small stones skittering into the yawning channel, the sound was magnified a dozen times over. The tunnel curved slightly round to the left after a time, and Phin was just starting to think that a thread of light might be showing from somewhere, and wondering if he dared hope they were approaching a street grid, when Roland said, ‘What’s that?’

  ‘What? Where?’

  ‘There’s something lying on the ground up ahead.’

  ‘What kind of something?’ Phin moved the torch, trying to quell apprehension, because anything might be down here.

  ‘I don’t know. It’s a sort of huddled shape.’

  ‘We’ll have to step over it a bit carefully,’ said Phin, shining the torch. ‘Because … Oh. Oh God.’

  They both stood very still, staring down at the huddled shape. It lay on the ground, half against the wall, and in the torchlight it was unmistakable. A human head. A human body. The bones black—

  ‘Black with age,’ said Roland, half to himself, and even as he said it, Phin thought: no, it’s black because it’s been burned. It’s charred.

  The nightmare possibilities reared up at once, and he pushed them away, and finally managed to say, ‘It must have been down here for years. Decades.’

  ‘Yes. Trapped down here,’ said Roland, horror rising in his voice.

  A dreadful silence seemed to close down. Phin thought – he knows we’re trapped, because he knows Loretta deliberately pushed him through that gate. She pushed me after him, because I saw what happened.

  But I can’t die down here like this, he thought. I won’t. He said, ‘Let’s go on. I still think there could be a grid or something – or that we’ll reach somewhere where there’s a phone signal.’

  They stepped over the hunched-up bones with difficulty, Phin going first, then shining his torch back for Roland to follow. Roland was pressing both hands against his chest, and his face was drenched in sweat, and Phin hoped the injury was as straightforward as a broken rib, and that the rib itself had not caused any internal injury.

  But now there was no doubt about the tunnel becoming lighter. From somewhere daylight was trickling in, and even if there was not a grille through which they could climb, there would almost certainly be a phone signal. Phin switched off the torch, and tried dialling.

  He had never been so grateful in his life to see the stored numbers come up, and to hear, when he tapped out Toby’s number, the ringing tone at the other end.

  London, 1890s

  Daisy sat on the edge of the circle of people, her eyes fixed on the thin face of the man behind the desk. There had been something called an Appeal following Madame’s trial. Daisy was not entirely clear about the details, but it might mean that a different judge would say Madame’s trial had been wrong – that Madame was not guilty after all, and she could go free. They were here in the Eaton Square house to be told what had happened.

  Rhun sat next to her, with Thaddeus Thumbprint on his other side. Cedric had remained at Maida Vale with Joe and the twins.

  It was strange to see these two men – Rhun and the distinguished gentleman called Charles – facing one another. It was probably impossible to say which of them had loved her more or which one she had loved more.

  ‘The Appeal was turned down,’ said Charles, and Daisy felt as if a massive black weight had fallen around her shoulders. ‘I couldn’t save her. I’m truly sorry.’ He spread his hands in a gesture of apology that was so humble Daisy wanted to cry. ‘They ruled that the evidence was clear and couldn
’t be overturned.’

  ‘Baskerville’s statement clinched it, of course,’ said Rhun, bitterly. ‘And the irony is that what she said was perfectly true.’

  ‘Yes. Scaramel did kill Daisy’s father. Belinda saw her do it. Scaramel was defending Daisy’s brother, of course, but even so … They produced her journal again,’ said Charles. ‘Even allowing for her jealousy, it was as damning as it had been at the trial. She knew about the visit here when we dealt with your father, Daisy. That counted for a lot, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Are you likely to be drawn in, sir?’ asked Daisy, nervously. ‘Because of how you helped that night?’

  ‘So far I’ve fought my way clear,’ he said, smiling at her.

  ‘What Belinda said about there being a cover-up was perfectly true, of course,’ put in Rhun. ‘There was a cover-up.’

  ‘Yes, but Miss Baskerville only got pieces of the story, and it got twisted. It was very believable, though,’ said Thaddeus. He and Cedric had gone to court each day, and had made careful notes in case there was anything that could be picked up and used for Madame’s defence.

  ‘I’m afraid a good many of the lawyers – and the judges and the police chiefs – knew about the real cover-up,’ said Charles. ‘That was what tipped the balance, I think. They knew the Ripper had been shut away in The Thrawl – they knew there must have been informants who helped with putting him there, even though they could never pin down the final piece of evidence they needed to charge him.’

  ‘Identification,’ said Daisy, with a shiver.

  ‘Yes. So it all made it very easy for them to believe that Scaramel really did kill the Ripper that night. May the evil creature continue to burn in hell.’

  ‘And because of it, Scaramel will hang,’ said Rhun, bleakly.

  ‘Yes. Murder’s the crime that can’t be condoned – that’s what the Appeal Court said in the summing-up.’

  ‘We’re very grateful for all you’ve done,’ said Thaddeus.

  ‘I haven’t done enough to save her life, though. I suppose the only other thing I could do …’

  ‘Yes?’ said Rhun, as Charles hesitated.