by Anne Perry
“Summink,” the woman replied. “Queer, though.” She shook her head. “She wanted ter know more. I said me pa’d bin a tosher, afore ’e got took, an’ she wanted ter know if I still knew any toshers now. Or gangers. I tol’ ’er me bruvver were a tosher, but I in’t seen ’im in years. She asked me ’is name. Now wot’d a nice young lady like that wanna find a tosher fer?”
“To learn more about hidden streams?” Rose suggested.
The woman’s eyes opened wide. “Wot fer? Yer don’ think one o’ them’s gonna break through, do yer?”
“Did she say that?”
“No! Course she din’t! D’yer think I’d be sittin’ ’ere wi’ a needle in me ’and if she ’ad? Me sister’s ’usband’s down there diggin’.” She made no reference to her own husband, one-armed, who was out somewhere in the streets trying to earn a living running errands for people. “Is this wot yer on about? Wot ’appened to ’er, anyway? Why are yer ’ere?”
Hester debated only for an instant. “She fell off Westminster Bridge and drowned. We are concerned it may not have been an accident. We need to know what she learned.”
“Nothin’ from ’ere that’d get her topped, I swear that on me muvver’s grave!”
They stayed another ten minutes, but the woman could add nothing.
Outside it was dark and the snow was beginning to accumulate, even though it was only shortly after six.
“Do you suppose she went looking for toshers?” Rose said unhappily.
“What for? To tell her where the underground streams were? Surely Argyll would have done all that. He can’t want a disaster—it would ruin him most of all.”
“I don’t know,” Hester admitted, beginning to walk towards the omnibus stop. Moving was better than standing still. “It doesn’t make any sense, and she must have known that. But she learned something. What could it be, other than that they are somehow using the machines dangerously, in order to be the fastest, and therefore get the best contracts? Are Argyll’s machines different from other people’s? We need to find out. Could they be more dangerous?”
Rose stopped, shuddering with cold. “It seems they work faster—so maybe they are. What can we do? These men won’t tell us anything—they daren’t!” There was anguish in her cry.
“I don’t know,” Hester answered. “All we can do is find out what happened to Mary…maybe. If she found proof of some sort—I mean something that would have shut down the works until the machines were made safe, even if it were slower—whom would she have told?”
“Morgan,” Rose said straightaway. “She didn’t. She never came back.”
They started walking again, as it was too cold to stand.
“Perhaps she wasn’t certain,” Hester suggested. “If it was almost complete, perhaps lacking one point…?”
They reached the bus stop and stood side by side, moving their weight from one foot to the other to prevent themselves from freezing.
“Toby?” Hester pressed. “She might have told him?”
Rose shook her head. “She didn’t trust him. He and Alan were very close.”
“Toby worked in the company?”
“Yes. She said he was very ambitious, and at least as clever as Alan, with engineering, at any rate. Perhaps not as good at handling men and as quick in business.”
Half an idea flashed into Hester’s mind, but it dissolved before she grasped hold of it. “So he would understand the machines?”
“Oh, yes. So others said.” Rose’s eyes widened. “You mean she might have been…been deliberately playing him…drawing information from him to get her final proof?”
“Mightn’t she?” Hester asked. “Would she have had the courage to do that?”
Rose did not hesitate. “Yes—by heaven, she would! And he was playing her, to see how much she knew! But it was too much! He had to kill her, because in the end his loyalty was to his brother.”
“And to his own ambition,” Hester retorted. She saw lights along the road and prayed it was the omnibus at last. Her teeth were chattering with the cold.
“How will we ever know?” Rose said desperately. “I absolutely refuse to let them get away with it, whatever it costs!”
The omnibus stopped and they climbed on, being obliged to stand jammed between tired workmen and women with bags of shopping followed by exhausted children with loud voices and sticky hands.
At the changeover to the second omnibus Rose gave a wry, blisteringly honest smile as she climbed onto the next platform and inside. “I shall never be rude to a coachman again!” she whispered fiercely. “I shall never insult the cook, outrage the maids, or argue with the butler. And above all, I shall never let the fire go out, even if I have to carry the coal in myself!”
Hester swallowed a laugh that was a little on the edge of hysteria.
“What are we going to do?” Rose demanded.
Hester’s mind raced, struggling between the practical and the safe. Safety won, at least for Rose. “You are going to see what chances there are of passing some kind of law to help the injured. Mary might have thought of that. It was probably why she approached Mr. Applegate in the first place. I’ll attempt to locate the toshers Mary spoke to and see what they told her. If anyone knows where the old sunken rivers are, or if anything’s changed course, it’ll be them.”
“Be careful!” Rose warned.
“I will,” Hester assured her.
But she did not tell Monk anything other than that she had visited some of those injured in past cave-ins and other machine accidents. She certainly did not reveal her plans. And she lost no time in composing a brief letter to Sutton, telling him of her need to learn more from the toshers who knew the old system best. Only after she had sent it did she realize that she had no idea whether Sutton could read or not! He did all his business in cash. Perhaps even the best houses did not wish a bill or a receipt from a ratcatcher.
She waited all day for an answer, busying herself with chores, cleaning up after the plasterer.
Sutton came just after dark, at about half past four.
“Yer sure?” he asked carefully, studying her face in the kitchen gaslight. He sipped a steaming cup of tea, and had accepted a piece of fruitcake. He was scrupulous to give Snoot a tiny portion, just so he felt included. It probably amounted to no more than a couple of raisins. Snoot took them delicately and licked his chops, waiting hopefully for more.
“That’s yer lot!” Sutton told him, shaking his head, then turned back to Hester.
“Well if yer sure yer really want ter know wot’s ’appened, someone as’ll tell yer the truth, we’d best go under the Thames Tunnel an’ find some o’ the folks wot’s not still ’opin’ fer work, or got loyalties to them as is.” He looked her up and down anxiously. “But yer can’t come like that. If I take yer with me, yer gotta look like yer belong. If I bring yer the clothes, can yer come as me lad wot I’m teachin’?”
She was taken aback for a moment, amusement replaced by the sudden jar of reality. “Yes,” she said soberly. “Of course I can. I’ll tie my hair back and put a cap on.” It was an unreasonably displeasing thought that with a change of attire she could be taken for a ratcatcher’s apprentice. And yet had she been more buxomly built, with a rounder, more womanly face, then she would not have been able to go at all.
Then she thought of the faces of the women she had seen yesterday, worn out and old long before their time, color and softness taken from them. Suddenly self-regard seemed not only ridiculous but disgusting. “I’ll be ready,” she said firmly. “What time shall we begin?”
“I’ll come ’ere,” he said, still uncertain of himself. “At breakfast. We’ll start early. Not as it makes much difference under the…ground.”
She knew he had been going to say river but stopped himself at the last moment, in case the thought should be too much for her, especially since they had been talking of cave-ins, floods, and gas.
“I’ll be here,” she said with a smile, catching his eye and see
ing the answering humor in it, and a flicker of admiration that pleased her quite unreasonably.
He nodded and rose to his feet.
By the next morning the clothes that Sutton provided had been laundered. They were still shabby and badly patched; however, Hester found them more comfortable than she had expected. It was an oddly naked feeling to have no skirts. Even on the battlefield she had been used to the nuisance of skirts around her legs, making striding difficult, especially in wind or rain. Trousers were marvelous, even if she did feel indecent.
Scraping her hair back into a knot and clipping it tight so it appeared short was not difficult, but it was certainly unflattering. But there was no help for it. A flat cap on her head covered most of it anyway, even down over her ears. Sutton had been thoughtful enough to provide a thick woollen muffler that made her feel considerably warmer. The coat, which came almost to her knees, was the last item, apart from a pair of weather-beaten and awkwardly fitting men’s boots.
She left the room where she had changed and walked self-consciously along the passage towards the staircase.
“Yer done wonders,” Sutton said approvingly. “Come on, Snoot! We got business.”
She explained to him as they walked what she and Rose had learned about Mary Havilland.
“That’s funny,” he said, considering it carefully. “Were she lookin’ fer streams an’ the like, or trying ter find out wot ’er pa knew, if ’e knew summink ter kill ’im for? But why fer? Streams in’t no secret, leastways if they cross one an’ it makes a cave-in, the ’ole world’s gonna know!”
“It doesn’t make any sense,” she agreed, walking quickly in order to keep up with him. “There’s something major in this that we don’t know. Either that, or somebody is very stupid.”
They traveled by omnibus again, until they reached the northern entrance at Wapping. Hester was startled to see that the building in which it was situated was large and very handsome, so much so that she felt as if she were entering the hall of some concert chamber. She glanced sideways at Sutton, who bent and picked up Snoot, then solemnly carried him down the long, circular steps to the level below, where the tunnel itself opened onto something rather like a hallway. With a dawning of amazement she realized that no vehicle could get out into the open air. The only way up or down was the great stair.
Sutton put Snoot down and the little dog trotted obediently at his heels across the paved floor to the tunnel entrance. Because of the many windows there was plenty of light in this part, but Hester realized that as soon as they were any distance inside, there would be only such light as was afforded by gas jets.
“Stay close to me,” Sutton warned. “There’s lots o’ folk down ’ere, an’ most is ’armless enough, but the livin’ is ’ard an’ people fight for a scrap o’ food or a yard o’ space, so don’t do nothin’ but look.”
She kept pace with him obediently. The light became dimmer as they progressed. The air took on a hazy quality, and she was acutely aware of the damp on her skin and the changed smell. The ceiling was far higher than she had expected and after a few yards it was lost from sight, giving a sensation of being closed in that was felt rather than seen. She knew that only a little farther on above it was the teeming, filthy water of the Thames. She refused to dwell on how the arch resisted the weight of earth and then the river itself, not to mention the currents and the tides.
The air smelled stale and was bitterly cold. But then one would hardly heat the tunnel with fires. There was no possible ventilation here. To create any sort of outlet to the open air would undermine the safety of the tunnel. If it fell in, they would be entombed here forever!
Hester chided herself for the ridiculous thought. If you were dead, they buried you anyway, so what difference would it make? Or perhaps Dante was right: death was not a ceasing to exist, but an endless journey through hell—a pit like this, full of strange, half-heard noises, whispers without words, not human anymore.
All senses were distorted. Damp clung in the nose and on the skin. There were gas jets on the walls, and in the dusklike light she could see people moving like shadows, most of them women. They seemed to be buying and selling, by touch as much as by sight in the flickering gloom, as if it were one nightmare arcade of stalls, a sort of hell’s market. Sound was heavy and unnatural, a susurration of feet and skirts and snatches of voices.
“Don’t stare!” Sutton warned her under his breath. “Yer ’ere ter catch rats, not sightseein’, Miss ’Ester.”
“I’m sorry,” she apologized. “Who are they all? Do they come down here every day?”
“Most of ’em don’t never go up,” he answered. “We might ’ave ’alf a mile ter go.”
“Whom are we looking for?”
They were keeping to the middle of the way, but as her eyes became accustomed to the gloom she was more aware of alcoves to the side. Those hollows must be where people might eat and sleep and—from the rank odor that now filled the air—conduct other aspects of their lives. It was a whole subterranean world, always damp and yet without natural water. She tried to ignore the scurrying of inhuman feet, the rattle of claws, or the pinpoint of red eyes in the shadows.
“People ’oo live in one tunnel often know things about other tunnels,” Sutton said in answer to her question. “Everythin’ ’ere ’as to be fetched from somewhere else. I’ll find yer a tosher ’oo knows the ’idden rivers as well as the ones on the maps, an’ mebbe someone ’oo knows a navvy or two ’oo’s bin ’urt an’ in’t so quick to defend ’is old bosses. Jus’ leave the askin’ ter me, right?”
“Right.” She said only the single word, keeping her voice low, as if the shadows could remember her. They continued deeper under the river, where the silence was broken only by voices so low that they seemed wordless amid the scraping and the hiss of the gas jets. Every now and then there was the clang of metal on metal or the duller thud of wood as someone worked. It was an eerie world where daylight was unknown.
Sutton pressed on, stopping now and then to greet someone by name, ask a question, make a wry, bitter joke. Hester hated it. There was no wind, no plants, no animals except rats and the occasional dog. Snoot trembled with excitement at the scent of so much prey, looking up at Sutton and waiting for the word that never came.
They had already spoken to five people and were nearly half a mile under the river when Sutton found the man he most wanted. In the yellow glare of the gas his face looked cast of metal. It was scarred down one side, his ear torn and his hair tufted where the scalp had been ripped away. He was lean, and his hands were gnarled and huge-knuckled with rheumatism.
“ ’Allo, Sutton!” he said with surprise. “Not enough rats fer yer in the Palace, then?” He grinned, showing strong teeth.
“ ’Allo, Blackie,” Sutton replied. “I done such a good job they’re all gorn. ’Ow are yer?”
“Stiff,” Blackie replied with a shrug. “Can’t get arter ’em fast enough no more. Got ’elp, ’ave yer?” He looked at Hester curiously.
“Not much use yet,” Sutton told him. “But ’e’ll do. In’t built fer navvyin’.”
Blackie looked at Hester thoughtfully, and she stared back at him, refusing to lower her eyes. Blackie laughed. It was a wheezy, cheerful sound. “ ’Ope ’e’s clever, then. ’E in’t good fer much else, eh?”
Hester wanted to respond, but she remembered just in time that she could not mimic the accent she would have if she were really learning to be a ratcatcher. Nor could her voice sound like that of a boy of the height she was.
“Navvyin’ in’t so clever.” Sutton shook his head. “Too chancy these days. Railways are one thing, tunnels is ’nother.”
“Yer damn right!” Blackie agreed.
Sutton looked at him closely. “Yer reckon one of ’em’s goin’ ter cave in, Blackie?”
“That’s wot they’re sayin’.” Blackie curled his lip, making his lopsided face look less than human in the yellow light. “Word is ’em stupid sods is gonna keep on cuttin’
till they cross a river an’ drown ’alf the poor devils wot are diggin’ there like a lot o’ bleedin’ moles.”
Hester drew in her breath to ask him to be more specific, then gasped as Sutton kicked her sharply. She shut her mouth and bit her lip with pain to stop crying out.
“ ’Oose works?” Sutton asked casually. “I don’t wanna get caught in it.”
“Go down, do yer?” Blackie squinted at him.
“Bin known ter,” Sutton acknowledged. “Think it’ll be Bracknell and ’is lot?”
“Mebbe. More like Paterson’s.”
“Argyll?”
Blackie gave him a keen look. “You ’eard summink, ’ave yer?”
“Whispers. They true?”
“They move faster’n most, but Sixsmith’s a canny bastard. Very careful, ’e is. But the engines wot ’e uses are big, an’ stronger than most. I reckon they done summink ter ’em, made ’em better. Could slice through an old sewer wall an’ bring a cave-in quick as spit.”
Hester was aching to ask for details, but her leg was still smarting from where Sutton had kicked her.
“So I ’eard,” Sutton agreed. “But I thought it were just daft talk o’ some girl. ’Er pa were scared o’ the dark or summink. Lost ’is nerve an’ shot ’isself, they said. Mind, she never believed it. Said someone else done ’im in.”
Blackie’s eyes narrowed and he leaned forward sharply. “I’d keep yer face shut about that if I was you, Sutton,” he said very quietly. “Stick ter rattin’, eh? It’s nice an’ safe, an’ yer know wot yer doin’. Don’t go down no ’oles in the ground, an’ don’ go askin’ no questions. O’ course they ’ave safety rules, an’ o’ course they don’ use ’em. Fastest one through gets the next contract, easy as that. Better buried alive fer maybe than starved or froze fer sure.” He dropped his voice still further. “I owe yer, Sutton, an’ I owed yer pa, so I’ll tell yer for nothin’. Stick ter rattin’. It’s clean an’ yer don’ upset no one but the rats. There’s things about tunnels as yer don’ want ter know, an’ people in ’em sure as ’ell’s burnin’ yer don’ want as should know you! One feller special, so keep yer nose ter yerself. Got it?”