by J C Briggs
Inspector Shackell came out to report that Mrs Curd had been scooped up from the floor and was presently in handcuffs — just in case she thought to resist arrest for brawling.
‘Lend us two bob, yer honour. I’m a poor man wot ’asn’t ’is cab fare,’ Dickens whined.
Inspector Shackell laughed out loud, ‘You’re a card, sir, and no mistake. I’ll get a cab for you. Do you want that seeing to?’ He pointed to Dickens’s bloodied cheek.
‘Thank you, no, we’ll get on our way.’
‘Mr Jones’ll wanter know.’
‘Good job you found me, young Scrap.’
They waited in the cab while Inspector Shackell spoke to the driver and handed over the fare. Scrap looked at Dickens’s wet coat and sniffed. ‘Coulda bin a piss-pot,’ he observed philosophically.
‘Very consoling, I’m sure,’ Dickens answered, attempting to clean off some of the blood from his face with his handkerchief.
‘Spit on it,’ said his philosopher.
Dickens did so, wincing. Lord, it hurt.
Scrap looked at him pityingly. ‘It woz the music wot did it.’
Dickens saw the glint in his eye and laughed. The concertina breathed out the last off-key note of its unmusical life.
The cab rolled away. Dickens gazed out into Amwell Street, holding his handkerchief to his throbbing cheek. A woman waiting to cross glanced at the cab — the way you sometimes looked without much interest at a stranger and held his eyes for a second or two — an unimportant moment, unless the seeming stranger was one you knew.
The woman was Violet Pout. She knew him, too, in a moment of startled recognition.
The cab was picking up speed. Dickens twisted round in his seat, but she was gone, vanished into the dark. There was only a faint mist wreathing the gas lamp.
22: Tales Told
The Superintendent was deep in the Police Gazette, peering at it through a magnifying glass when Sergeant Rogers ushered in the adventurers. Scrap’s eyes were alive with excitement. When Jones saw the blood on Dickens’s face and his swollen cheek, he wondered if he had enjoyed himself quite as much.
‘Altercation?’ he asked.
‘With a pewter cup,’ Dickens replied.
‘Anyone interesting?’
‘Mrs Curd — she threw her beer at me, too.’
‘What on earth did you do to her?’
‘What you might call a case of mistaken identity — she took me for a murderer in a pub called The Forlorn Hope.’
Dickens left it to Scrap to tell the tale. Jones would enjoy it more that way.
‘Mr D ses ’e’s lookin’ fer Miss Pout — ’appens ter mention Jemima Curd an’ we sort o’ pretend ter be Mr Curd an’ ’is boy. Mrs Curd — drunken ol’ crone — takes offence and goes fer ’im an’ — well — things go down’ill a bit. Folk gets a bit worked up, screamin’ blue murder. Some great ’ulk collars me. Bashes ’im on the nose and kicks ’im in — well, yer knows where, an’ Mr D goes at ’em all wiv ’is concertina —’
‘Which I happened to have about me,’ put in Dickens, seeing Jones’s enquiring glance.
‘Concertina box breaks a bloke’s ead, an’ I scarpers, shoutin’ fer the perlice. Some feller tries ter stop me wiv a chair an’ misses. Some other bloke cops it an’ I gets out. Inspector Shackell’s comin’ along the street wiv is men an’ some girl gets Mr D out of it. Concertina won’t play again. Just as well — we dint make much from ’is playin’ — got tol’ ter move on a few times an’ Mr D gives all the takin’s away.’
‘How much?’ asked Jones mildly.
‘One an’ six an’ two farthin’s, a button, an’ a bit o’ cake — stale an’ all so it ain’t worth eatin’.’
‘You said the pie was all right,’ Dickens said, somewhat aggrieved.
‘So it woz — not that I ’ad time ter finish it.’
‘I do beg your pardon, Scrap — most disobligin’ of me.’
‘Wouldn’t a’ missed it, Mr D — not even the concertina.’ Scrap winked at him.
‘Inspector Shackell kindly paid for our cab. And, by the way, in case you were thinking we had achieved nothing —’
‘Not at all, not at all — it is all — most interesting.’ Jones was surreptitiously wiping his eyes.
‘Inspector Shackell is bringing Mrs Curd along — soon, I should think, and there’s more. The Forlorn Hope was not such a forlorn hope — I saw Violet Pout in Amwell Street, but I was in the cab and when I turned round, she’d vanished.’
‘That is encouraging news. Now, I doubt very much if Mrs Curd will want to see your bloody visage again, so I suggest that you get away home to have your war wounds dressed. Scrap can go home with Alf. Heroic, you were, I know, but be careful what you say to Mollie.’
Scrap went out with Rogers.
Jones could not hold in his laughter. ‘A concertina an offensive weapon — only you, Charles, only you. I didn’t know you could play it.’ He mopped his eyes again.
‘One of my many accomplishments — the accordion is my preferred instrument — though Scrap wasn’t impressed, and neither were two urchins who called me “ol’ buryin’ face”. What a day — I shall feel it tomorrow.’
‘Time you went home. I’ll see you tomorrow — Mrs Curd might have something to tell us.’
At Devonshire Terrace, much exclamation greeted Dickens’s swollen face — he had deposited his coat and spectacles at the office in Wellington Street so there was no wonder at his torn garments and the smell of beer. Offers to bathe the swelling, to apply witch hazel, iodine, or a kiss from twelve-year-old Mamie were made — the last he accepted, and a cup of tea.
There was a gathering round the drawing room fire. Certain persons ought to have been in bed, but there was a general outcry at the injustice of such a suggestion. Bed was for babies like Dora, Henry and Sydney. Big boys like Alley and Frank, who had sneaked in behind Aunt Georgy, deemed themselves quite capable of hearing about Pa’s encounter with an enemy.
‘Pa, Pa, was it a fight? Did you win it? Did you punch him back?’ This was Alfred, known as Alley, aged five, stocky already and putting up his little fists.
Frank, always more timid, nevertheless looked at Pa with shining eyes. Dickens remembered his fright at Pa’s temper this morning. Forgiven, again.
‘Sit by me, Frank. Not a fight exactly,’ said Dickens, buying time to invent a story which would satisfy the sanguinary hopes of Alley whilst paying due to the delicacies of the ladies. He wasn’t going to recount the events at The Forlorn Hope. A brush with a door post was now too late a tale — Alley and Frank were all eyes.
‘If you’ll sit down, Alley, my boy, I will tell all — about the mad dogs with their slavering chops, and the dark-haired gypsy man who had hands as big as hams. A villain of the deepest dye who deserved my vengeance…’
His audience was rapt. The tale was not a long one, but it was full of incident — not too gory, and the hero used guile and the utmost cunning to defeat his brutal enemy who had struck that one blow — only one, mind.
‘What really happened?’ asked Catherine later, as she bathed his cheek with witch hazel. ‘Mad dogs, indeed.’
‘An old hag threw a pewter pot at me.’
‘Why?’
‘I don’t think she liked me.’
Catherine laughed. ‘Were you with the Superintendent?’
‘I was — research amongst the criminal classes for Household Words.’ Dickens never told his wife much about their investigations. It would only alarm her, and she was nervous enough these days. Dora, the baby, was a fragile little thing.
She kissed him. ‘Well, duck next time.’
‘I will.’ He kissed her round cheek and stroked the brown ringlets. ‘Now, I have much to do — I won’t disturb you, I’ll sleep in the dressing room. It will be a long night’s work.’
23: A Death in Ferrara
Dickens took an early breakfast. He wanted to be out of the house before there were any more questions. Alley was
tenacious. He would want the story told over — again and again.
Two letters came. He recognised Mrs Carlyle’s writing; the other hand he did not know. He took them with him to Wellington Street where, in his own office, he opened Mrs Carlyle’s.
I must be brief. I have only just heard — just a rumour so far. Fanny picked it up last night. Lady Fane is very ill — a heart attack. Near death, it is said. I will write more when I find out…
Poor Lady Fane. He wasn’t surprised. What she had endured. Her daughter’s ruin. And had she known about Dolly Marchant? All those years — and the son? Had she known about him? Had she known about Violet Pout? He was certain there must have been something between those two after what Pryor had told him. Sir Neptune had been kind enough to his wife. He had seen that, but she was frightened of him. He remembered her at the door of the library at Wisteria Lodge — how nervous she had been. She had not known then that he had come about Violet Pout.
If she died? What would that mean for Dolly Marchant? Did she still love him? She had not answered his question. But it would mean complete rupture from her son. She had wept about him. He could not believe that she would become the second Lady Fane.
He must go to tell Sam. Sam could hardly go back to Wisteria Lodge now — even if he had good reason. That was a thought — Lady Fane near death. If only he knew more. He supposed eminent doctors would be called — Sir Neptune could hardly … no, that was out of the question. Now, if she had died suddenly then his suspicions might have some weight.
He glanced at the other letter — a matter of business, perhaps. Probably a begging letter from some struggling literary man. He received dozens of them. Now, he looked closely, he thought the writing familiar. He would have a quick look — he could pass it on to Harry Wills if it were not important.
He opened it and glanced first at the signature: Luigi Mariotti
He felt that tremor go through him, that pricking of the thumbs as if an electric charge had passed through him.
Luigi Mariotti had taught Italian to him and Catherine before they had left for their year-long stay in Italy. Dickens had first met him on his voyage to America on the SS Britannia in 1842. Mariotti had been going to Canada to take up the Chair of Modern Languages at King’s College Windsor, but he had not stayed and had returned to London in 1843. Dickens had met him again and Mariotti had become their teacher — a good one, too. He was one of the many revolutionary Italians who had settled in London, and he knew a good many people: Robert Browning, an ardent supporter of Italian Unification; he was a friend of Lady Byron who was a sponsor of Giuseppe Mazzini’s School for Italian boys in Hatton Garden — the school which Dickens supported, too.
Dickens had met him again at the Carlyles’ house — Mariotti was a frequent visitor there, where he had met Thackeray and Bulwer-Lytton. He had made a great success of London as a writer and lecturer who had published a book on Italy and written many articles on Italian politics, as well as being a Professor of Italian at London University. He had reverted to his own name, Antonio Gallenga, in recent times. Mariotti had been an alias adopted in earlier revolutionary days in Italy.
The letter asked Dickens to dine at the Piazza that evening at six o’clock for he had someone he wanted Dickens to meet. If not then, could Dickens suggest another occasion?
Dickens was intrigued — who might this stranger be? Mariotti had many friends in London — perhaps the man was a writer of some sort, wanting to write for Household Words; perhaps Dickens had turned him down at some point and he wished to be presented in person. And, here was another point: Mariotti was a good friend of the artists Rossetti and Gambardella Spiridione, who had painted Mrs Carlyle’s portrait. He would show Mariotti the portrait of Flora Lambert — he might know the original, or Spiridione might. He sent a reply immediately.
At Bow Street, Jones was busy with his magnifying glass. ‘You have news,’ he said, observing Dickens’s face.
‘I have, though it is not confirmed. Mrs Carlyle writes that Lady Fane is mortally ill — a heart attack. I thought you should know.’
Jones leant back in his chair. ‘Well, that closes the doors of Wisteria Lodge to me. I can hardly intrude in a dying woman’s house about a servant who no longer works for them and who was found dead in Clerkenwell — miles away from Chelsea.’
‘It makes you think, though — convenient for Sir Neptune if she dies. She cannot talk about her daughter, or Jemima Curd. Suppose she knew about Violet Pout.’
‘And you said he had a liaison with a married woman — I’ll bet Lady Fane knew. It almost seems as if his house is falling away about him.’
‘He might be desperate. What did Mrs Curd say?’
‘You mean amid her drunken ramblings about the murderer ’oo oughter ’ave bin strung up? She was very firm on that point. She did remember seeing Jemima, but not when, and she did think that Jemima was working for some lady called Pott or Spot — too drunk to remember clearly.’
‘Near enough Pout.’
‘Inspector Shackell and his constables are combing the area round Armwell Street — concentrating on lodging houses of a respectable sort. He’ll find her — eventually.’
‘I asked that girl who got me out of The Forlorn Hope. Very sharp, she was. Knew I was a toff from my shirt cuffs and my polished boots. She complimented Scrap on his impersonation of a street urchin, given he was a toff, too.’
Jones laughed. ‘What did Scrap say?’
‘Convincing as you like: “I am much obliged, Miss Hanlon” — with the ‘H’. I gave her my card and told her to come to Wellington Street if she finds Violet Pout. Now, as to our other matter, I am to dine this evening with Signor Luigi Mariotti —’
‘Artist, is he?’
‘Very droll, Samivel, but he knows a great many people. I thought I would take the picture of Flora Lambert. I feel sure I know it — not that I know how it helps.’
Dickens presented himself at the Piazza at six o’clock where Luigi Mariotti greeted him with great enthusiasm, telling him that he had a tremendous surprise for him.
They approached a table where Mariotti’s other guest stood. Dickens felt he was familiar; he stepped forward — a London restaurant disappeared, and he was standing by a bridge on a glittering Venetian morning. He held out his hand. ‘You look better fed that when I saw you last, Signor Paladini.’
‘You remember.’ Aurelio Paladini gave him a broad smile.
‘Very well, sir. I did not forget that ruined palace and that ghost story.’
They sat and talked of Italy and of exile.
‘Mr Dickens is a true friend of our country, my dear Paladini.’ Turning to Dickens, Mariotti said, ‘I read the piece in The Examiner: “They seek a refuge here in England, the only free land where they may set foot, forlorn and penniless, bereft.” Your words, I am told — as if I did not know the generous spirit —’
‘Enough,’ laughed Dickens, amused at Mariotti’s dramatic rendering.
They spoke of their first meeting — the voyage to America, the storms, the drunken cook, the broken plates and the beer bottles rolling on the deck, and the dreadful sea-sickness.
‘While I languished prostrate upon my sick-bed, I imagined our friend striding the deck, impervious to such weakness. I was recovered from the very instant I heard from the doctor that he had been obliged to put a mustard poultice on Signor Mariotti’s stomach.’
The chops were good, and so was the wine. Dickens noticed how Aurelio Paladini ate heartily and felt glad.
‘And this is the man who taught me your native tongue, though you, Signor Paladini, answered me in English.’
‘And you, Mr Dickens, spoke to a beggar as if he were a gentleman, and gave me money. I did not gamble it away. I ate my hot dinner and took the train for my home town. It was time to begin a new life. You gave me that, sir. I did not know that my Signor Dickens was Charles Dickens until I came to London and read your Pictures from Italy. I knew it was you.’
‘Ho
w so?’
‘The wonder of so rare a dream … decayed apartments where furniture was mouldering away … Desdemona at her window — I knew.’
‘What a memory you have.’
‘It was a meeting that changed my life.’
Luigi Mariotti excused himself and went to speak to someone.
‘Do you remember my story of the monk and the maiden?’ asked Dickens.
‘I do — your masquerade. Did you find your bella signorina?’
‘No, I left Venice after that. I went to Verona, where I read the sequel to my story. The newspaper reported a girl dragged from the canal by the old Palazzo Mariano — thought to be strangled by her own rosary. Did you hear that?’
‘I left Venice that night while my resolution was still strong in me — so, no, Mr Dickens, I did not know that, but I can tell you something else: I went home — to Ferrara.’
Dickens put down his glass. He almost expected to see sparks fly from his thumbs, and the hairs on the back of his neck prickled — that electric charge again. Aurelio Paladini looked at him with an expression of such disquiet that he hardly knew him.
‘Go on.’
‘Three days before I went home, a girl had been found drowned — on the evening of November the tenth.’
‘Where?’
‘Just before you enter the city, on the road from Bologna, there is a little bridge over some water —’
‘I know it.’ Dickens could hardly breathe.
‘Some peasant girls standing on the bridge as they often did, in the evening sunshine, saw her. She was brought out — she had been strangled by her rosary. Some said it was suicide, but a verdict of accident was brought in — to save her from damnation.’
‘But I was in Ferrara then — I did not hear of it.’
‘It was hushed up at first so that enquiries could be made — there was talk of some lover, but she was the daughter of an eminent man who had the ears of others as powerful as he, so no more was published of that. She was a very beautiful girl. I heard tell famed for her golden hair. A strange coincidence, I think, a horrible one.’