by Alex Grecian
Now that the matter had come down to money, the man seemed to relax. He smiled for the first time, and when he did, the landlady shivered.
“We’ll give you forty a week for the room. Two weeks in advance. And we’ll take our meals elsewhere.”
“Forty? A week?” The old woman leaned toward him and shook her head. “I hate to say it, I do, but you can get a better place ’n this for forty a week, sir.”
“Yes.”
“Well then, I’ll take yer money. What name would you like on the register?”
“None. If we wanted a name on the register, we’d stay somewhere that didn’t smell of rat piss.”
“Gotta put sumpin’ down for the inspectors.”
“Very well, put down Parker.”
“Mr and Mrs, then?”
“If it suits you.”
“Gimme an hour or so to clear out a room.”
“Clear the mattresses off the beds, too, or the floor if there are no beds.”
“We got proper beds here, like.”
“Good. Send a boy round for new mattresses. Clean mattresses. We’ll pay for those, too.”
“New mattresses?”
“And linens. New. Never used. Have them on the beds when we return.”
“New mattresses, new linens. That’ll cost, sir.”
The man smiled again, and the old woman backed away from him. He reached into his pocket and drew out three coins. He took the landlady’s hand, turned it over, and laid the coins on her palm. “I trust that will suffice.”
The old woman drew in a sharp breath through her nose and nodded. The man nodded in return.
“Never seen a lady wear a man’s clothings before.” The old lady jerked her thumb in the woman’s direction. “Don’t she talk?”
“Oh, you wouldn’t want her to talk,” the man said. “I’m the polite one.” He took his companion’s arm, and the two of them left the house without another word or a backward look. The man pulled the door quietly shut behind them.
When she was sure they were gone, the old woman clutched her wrist where the man had touched her. It felt icy cold.
5
Nevil Hammersmith stood in the middle of his flat and looked round, expecting to see a thick layer of dust and cobwebs coating the familiar mantel, the table under the window, the single wooden chair, and the hot plate. He had always lived a monastic existence, but had spent the majority of his time lately in the cluttered office, eating fish pies and tea and sleeping on the floor when his eyes grew heavy from poring over the same witness reports and news articles again and again, looking for some previously neglected clue that might lead him to Walter Day. But the flat was neat and tidy. There was a flowerpot on the table, and a green plant stretched upward toward the window above. Hammersmith peered at this new addition to the flat and blinked twice, not sure what to think about it. He leaned slightly forward on his toes, his hands behind his back, as if in unconscious competition with the plant for sunlight.
He heard footsteps on the stairs, and a moment later the door opened and Timothy Pinch entered, bringing with him the mingled scents of chocolate and sugar and lemon rind from the confectionery downstairs. Timothy paused when he saw Hammersmith, then grinned and crossed the room to him.
“Nevil,” he said. “Good to see you. It’s been weeks, hasn’t it?”
Hammersmith nodded. “I stayed here last Tuesday night, I think. Maybe Wednesday.”
“Sorry to have missed you. It’s been so lonely, I had to get some company for myself.” Pinch pointed to the plant. “A maidenhair fern. It’s almost as talkative as you are.”
Hammersmith grimaced, then tried to turn it into a smile.
“Sorry,” Pinch said. “What brings you?”
“I left a file here,” Hammersmith said. “At least, I think I did. Can’t remember where I put it.”
“Ah, yes, I’ve tidied up a bit here and there. Anything that looked like it might be related to your work I’ve put in the top drawer of the desk.” Pinch pointed to the small rolltop in the corner where the hallway narrowed and led back to the two bedrooms.
Hammersmith nodded his thanks and rummaged through the drawer. The file he wanted was beneath a report on the weather conditions the evening Walter Day had disappeared.
“Perfect,” he said.
“Tea?”
“No, thank you,” Hammersmith said. “I really ought to get back to the office. Unless you . . .”
“I was going to have some myself.”
“Well, then, I suppose I’d be glad of it.”
“Good.”
Pinch busied himself at the fireplace while Hammersmith waited, feeling like a stranger in his own home, which he decided he probably was. Once a fire was going and a kettle had been put on to boil, Pinch stood and rubbed his hands together. He grinned again and clapped.
“Now,” he said, “tell me everything.”
“About what?”
“You know. Cases. Investigations. That sort of thing.”
“Ah, no, nothing much to report, I’m afraid.”
Pinch clicked his tongue and frowned, disappointed. He was two or three years younger than Hammersmith, and two or three inches shorter, but he gave the impression of greater height, as if he only needed to straighten out his gawky frame and unkink his limbs to throw off the shackles of adolescence. Under slick fawn-colored hair, his eyes were the clear blue of an undisturbed pool, and a family of squirrels might have comfortably sheltered in the shadow of his nose. He vibrated with nervous energy. Hammersmith glanced at the complex pattern of chemical burns and stains on Pinch’s laboratory coat, which he never seemed to remove, except for dinner.
Hammersmith looked away, back at the intruder houseplant. “And what about you? How go the studies?”
“Fascinating,” Pinch said. “Really just fascinating. I can’t tell you. Dr Kingsley is ahead of his time. I’m just incredibly lucky to be able to work with him.”
In addition to his duties at University College Hospital, Dr Bernard Kingsley was the official forensics examiner for the Metropolitan Police. The busy doctor had been in need of a capable assistant for some time, and Pinch was his most promising student. Pinch squatted before the fire again and launched into a one-sided discussion of the migratory habits of maggots within a festering corpse. Hammersmith nodded and sat at the table, watched as thick tendrils of fog brushed against the windowpanes.
He missed his previous flatmate. Charming, funny, proudly superficial Pringle. He and Colin Pringle had not been much alike, but he had trusted Colin, depended on him. He sniffed the air as if he might still catch a phantom whiff of the hair tonic Colin had worn or the sprig of mint he had chewed. But the act of conjuring Pringle’s memory made his absence more acute. Hammersmith blinked, grimaced, focused on Timothy Pinch and his wide, guileless face. Pinch was a friendly sort, but Hammersmith was in no mood to feign friendliness.
Hammersmith understood that he was becoming more reserved lately, that he sought out the company of others with decreasing frequency. He had never been a particularly outgoing person, had always been dedicated almost obsessively to his work, but he was getting worse. It seemed to him that the murder of Colin Pringle had been the first link in an ugly chain that stretched back over a year and a half: the formation of the Murder Squad, the discovery of Jack the Ripper in a cell under the city, Jack’s escape from his tormentors and Walter’s abduction, Hammersmith’s ouster from the police force, the new detective agency.
He wondered what Pringle might have thought of it all.
“I say,” Pinch said. “You look pale. Awfully sorry, old man. I forget most people don’t have the same affinity for maggots that I do.”
“More’s the pity.”
Pinch grinned at him and brought the kettle to the table, where he poured out two steaming cups of tea and added lem
on. Hammersmith stood, and they both sipped while watching the variations of grey move beyond their window.
6
The fog embraced Claire Day, cradled her as she moved along the street, protected her from the gaze of her fellow travelers. She carried an umbrella, but didn’t open it. The fog wasn’t wet or cold; it didn’t oppress. She saw nothing but grey in its many shades and variations, but she knew that there were other people around her somewhere, other streets ahead. Somewhere. Given enough time, she would stumble upon them, and given more time the fog would burn away and everything would be made clear.
Horses clopped along beside her, but Claire stayed on the path, unseen and self-contained. Today was a day for walking, and for once she didn’t want companionship. She strolled slowly, watching for the shapes of children and call boxes and tall thin gas lamps when they materialized in front of her.
She sensed movement and stopped, watched the rolling greyness, and waited for someone to appear, but no one did. She took a tentative step, then another, and saw a shape cross the path ahead. Another shape, a man, followed, and another, this one a woman connected to a smaller shape, a child holding her hand. Two men carried a huge box, a dark grey square punched out of its surroundings. Claire moved to the side of the path and stopped, reluctant to try navigating through the ragged parade. There was comfort in being unnoticed, but she didn’t want to surprise anyone. After a moment, as the queue of people marched past her and into the unseen street, she felt for the wall of the building behind her and sidled along it until she came to the corner. The quality of the fog changed. The spots and patches of light, of dark, of density and thinness, disappeared, the grey no longer adopting the characteristics of the doors and windows of the buildings around it. Here, there was only a swirling sameness. She stepped into an empty lot, weeds reaching at her through the dirt and fog.
There was no way to know how large the lot was or where the next building might be hiding. She shuffled forward, swinging her umbrella gently back and forth in front of her. Sounds—muffled voices, faraway footsteps, and hooves against cobblestones—drifted at her from somewhere, seeming remote and unimportant. She looked down just in time to stop herself from tripping over a chair.
It was a plain wooden chair set down in the middle of nowhere, and yet perhaps ten feet away from the street. Beyond it was another chair, and another, dark shapes squatting in the mist. She counted twenty of them, placed in haphazard rows, facing nothing. The queue of fogbound drifters had been some sort of impromptu audience for . . . for what? A preacher? A balladeer? One of the many science shows that had sprung up without a headquarters, traveling from post to post in a coach, demonstrating the latest electrical advances to passersby?
She gathered her skirts and sat in the chair closest to her. One leg of the chair was resting on a pebble or perhaps in a hole, and it rocked under her weight. The soft sound of her own breathing echoed back from faraway nearby walls. She listened and heard, too, shuffling footsteps coming from somewhere behind her, or in front of her, or even above her (for all she knew, there was a walkway of some sort up there), and yet she knew that nobody could see her, nobody would find her there unless they literally stumbled over her.
In a way, she thought, she was as lost as Walter was. She had never faltered in her conviction that he was alive. More precisely, she would have known if he were dead. She didn’t need evidence that he was out there somewhere in the fog. She only needed to know where. He might even be sitting in another chair in the same empty lot with her, only an arm’s length away and yet unreachable.
She imagined she might snap some make-believe reins and the chair under her would take off at a trot, lead her to her husband, the other chairs following behind. Poor Walter astonished but overjoyed to see her arrive at the head of a galloping wooden herd. They would ride away together, gather the boys and the twin girls on chairs of their own, and leave the city behind with all its wretchedness and mystery.
“If you don’t mind, miss.”
She started at the sound of the voice and jumped up off the chair, holding her umbrella like a weapon.
“Didn’t mean to frighten you.” She still couldn’t see the man who was talking, but his voice was quiet and gentle.
“I suppose I’m a bit nervous,” Claire said to the nothingness. “Have you been standing here all along?”
“Thought I’d give you a minute to yerself. Looked like you might need a rest.”
“How could you know what I look like? You must have eyes like a bird.”
“Aye, that I do. You’ll excuse me I hope, but I’ve gotta get this last chair on the wagon soon or the horses’ll leave without me.”
“Last chair?” She peered around her and realized that the other squat shapes were gone. She was standing in front of the only chair left in the lot. “I didn’t even hear you take the others.”
“I’m a quiet sort when I need to be. Like I say, you looked like you needed the rest.”
“Thank you for letting me sit for so long.” How long had it been? “Do you mind if I ask, why were the chairs here? A meeting of some sort?”
“Puppet show, ma’am. Like for the children. Not many showed today, though. Too gloomy to see the show. Mostly we just done the voices and left the puppets in the box. Let them children imagine what they don’t see.”
“A puppet show. How lovely.”
“Well, thank you. Next time, when it’s cleared up some, you bring yer own young ones and they can watch the play for nothin’. You tell the ticket taker Jim said it was all right.”
“Very kind of you. I suppose I should get out of your way.”
“Not at all.” A small man detached himself from the fog and limped past her. One of his legs was short and twisted. He tipped his hat at her, bent and picked up the chair, and was almost instantly gone, faded away. She strained to hear his footsteps, but there was no sound. She turned her head back and forth and felt a small spike of panic in her throat.
“Wait,” she said. “Wait, sir. I don’t know which direction to walk. Where’s the street?”
There was no answer. Claire raised her umbrella so that it was parallel to the ground and took small steps until she felt the umbrella touch a wall. She scraped the point of the umbrella along bricks until it encountered empty air and then thrust forward, almost making her stumble.
“Oi! Watch it.” Someone marched past her, and she followed. Now she could once more hear the horses and the cries of vendors and the happy shrieks of children playing in the mist. She smiled and took a deep breath and made her slow way along the path, hoping she was headed in the direction of home.
As soon as she got there, she shut the door to the parlor, sat at her writing desk, and began to compose a new story about furniture that returned to the wood where it had once stood tall as trees. She did not hear the governess knock at the door or see the sun set. Everything disappeared for her except the scratching of her pen on paper, and she wrote well into the night.
7
Day woke and brushed a leaf off his face. The sky was completely dark and it took him a moment to realize that there was someone hovering over him. Day waited, tensing himself and wondering whether the cigars in his boot were still there. Somewhere he heard a fox rustling in the brush.
“I know you’re awake, Walter Day.”
Day took a quick shallow breath. He recognized the voice. It was him. It was the man Jack. He reached for his walking stick, but Jack put a hand on his arm.
“Why are you lying in a trench in a park, Walter Day? Why are you here in the mud, instead of . . . Well, you confound me. Why haven’t you gone home? Why aren’t you doing what I told you to do?”
Day swallowed hard. The words made little sense, but the voice filled him with fear. His mouth was dry and his eyes stung and he felt his bladder trying to give out. He closed his eyes—there was nothing to see anyway—and concentrated on mai
ntaining his dignity.
“You should answer me now.”
“I don’t . . . I don’t know what you mean.”
“I gave you a task, Walter Day.”
“I don’t know who that is.”
“You don’t know your own name?”
“I don’t know my name. Am I . . . Did you say my name? Just now, was that my name? Is that who I am?”
“Fascinating. In retrospect, I suppose I should have experimented with someone else before mesmerizing you.”
“Mez . . . ?”
“To be truthful, I was growing bored with you and I may have rushed things.”
“I don’t understand anything.”
“I know. What a shame. To think I once admired you. It’s my own fault, really. I’ve gone and broken my favorite toy.” Jack sighed, and Day heard him shift, leaning away. He kept his eyes closed. “I see you’re wearing the clothes I left for you,” Jack said. “Are they warm enough?”
“Yes. Thank you.”
“We can’t have the great Walter Day wandering about in a woman’s dress. It’s remarkable you haven’t become sick. How awfully hardy you are.”
“What name did you say?”
“Remarkable. I suppose I’ll have to fall back on my secondary plan now. A shame. It would have been so much more fun if things had worked out with you. But perhaps I’ll give you a bit more time.”
“Time for what?”
“Go home, Walter Day. Go home to your wife and her adorable children.”
“Home? I don’t know . . . Where is my home?” Day waited. “Jack?”
There was a long silence, and when Day opened his eyes, the shape had gone.
8
He did not hear from Jack again and, after enough time passed, he stopped having nightmares. He threw out the cotton dress when it became too filthy and too threadbare to keep him warm at night and bought a second shirt, which he washed and wore every other day while his primary shirt dried. He traded his boots, along with eleven recycled cigarettes, for another pair that fit him well. They were also secondhand, but in better repair, and they did not blister his feet and ankles as badly as the old pair had. He left money for the vendor who had unwittingly provided him with a dress in that first difficult week outside his cell. He also purchased a shallow wooden tray that folded over on itself and fastened with a simple clasp. At night, he stored his cigarettes and cigars inside it to keep them dry. During the day, he opened the tray and displayed his wares, taking a corner at the busy junction just north of London Bridge.