by Alex Grecian
“Caught some dangerous murderers in there,” the boy said. “Bloody-eyed madmen they are, too. You’d do well to stand back, Doctor, and let ’em do their job.”
Doctor? Jack looked down at the black leather bag he was holding and smiled.
“They sent for me,” he said. “Someone’s been hurt?”
“Yes, sir. They cut off somebody’s face, cut out his eyes, cut off his fingers, even cut out his tongue.”
Well, part of that was true, at least, Jack thought. Unless that silly fly had been very busy since Jack left the house.
“I’d better go take a look, then, hadn’t I?”
“You be careful and stay well back, like I say. Let them boys do their work.”
“I certainly will. Thank you for your help, son.”
There was an old lady talking to a little girl and a boy with a bicycle. Jack walked past them without being noticed and walked right through the door and into the house he now thought of as his own.
53
The house was empty.
Tiffany dispatched two of the constables to check the bedrooms upstairs. The other two went into the parlor, and Hammersmith went with them. Tiffany and Blacker proceeded down the hallway to the kitchen.
There was an odor of rotting meat in the parlor. A single ray of sunlight beamed through the front window, but did little to dispel the gloom. A bee buzzed lazily through the room and back out.
A chair was tipped back next to the hearth. Bits of twine curled around its legs and arms and around the cushioned back. Hammersmith knelt beside it and saw dark flecks that he was certain were blood on the brocaded seat.
“Oh, God almighty,” one of the constables said. Hammersmith looked up and followed the constable’s gaze to the mantelpiece. Two objects were nailed to the wood just below eye-level.
“That explains the smell in here,” Hammersmith said. “But why would there be meat on the mantel?”
“It ain’t just meat, Sergeant. Look at it.”
Hammersmith stood and took the three steps to the fireplace. He covered his nose with the back of his hand and leaned in for a better look. It took a moment for him to realize what the things were.
“Do you suppose they’re human?” the other constable said.
“Surely they’re lambs’ tongues,” Hammersmith said. But he wasn’t at all sure.
He heard the other two constables come down the stairs and clomp past the parlor door on their way to the kitchen.
“Get some more light in here, would you?” he said to the constable who had found the tongues. “And get those down from there.”
“I don’t wanna touch them things.”
“Find a pry bar. Put them in a basin. I’ll send for Dr Kingsley. He might be able to verify what sort of animal they came from.”
He started out of the room, then turned back.
“No, on second thought,” he said, “leave them there. Kingsley’s daughter can draw this all out for us. It might be important to know where everything is.”
He saw both constables relax, clearly pleased that they wouldn’t have to touch the bloody tongues.
Hammersmith went out of the parlor and turned left. The two constables who had been upstairs passed him on their way back out. One tipped his hat to Hammersmith. They went back past the parlor and out through the front door. Hammersmith watched them go, then walked down the hall and found the two inspectors in the kitchen, huddled over something on a big table. They looked up when he entered the room.
“It looks like they’ve gone,” Blacker said. “But they left a map. It might tell us where they went.”
“But it’s covered with markings,” Tiffany said. “They could be anywhere.”
Hammersmith looked around the room, at a piece of ham on the counter, shiny and hard, at breadcrumbs on the floor. He noticed a small stub of a pencil against the bottom edge of a cabinet leg. It looked like it had rolled off the table and across the room and lodged where it was unlikely to be noticed. The honeybee from the parlor careened past his nose and bumped into the edge of the back door, then corrected its flight path and disappeared outside.
“The back door’s open,” Hammersmith said. “Did you check the garden?”
“Of course,” Tiffany said.
“Look at this,” Blacker said. He led the way out the back door and past a flowering bush where more bees were hard at work tending to bright purple blossoms. There was a high wooden fence at the back of the garden, covered with thick leafy vines. Blacker pointed at the fence. “See that? See how the vines are torn away here? And here?” He pointed. “And up there?”
“Somebody climbed over that fence,” Hammersmith said.
“And they were none too neat about it. Maybe saw us coming and left in a hurry.”
“What’s on the other side?”
“Don’t know. Just sent two of these boys around the end of the street to find out.”
A voice came through the fence: “Over here now, sir!”
“That was quick,” Blacker said. “Anything to see?”
Hammersmith could hear the two constables tromping about in the garden on the other side.
“There’s some kind of a little tree over here,” the constable said. “Branches all broken away like somebody hung on ’em. And leaves all over the ground. Somebody tipped over a table here, too.”
“Is anyone at home over there?”
“Yes, sir. Got the lady of the house here with me. She seen one.”
“How long ago?”
“Not sure, sir. Should I go ask?”
“Just get her inside. We’ll be over to talk to her.”
Blacker turned to Hammersmith, excited. “We’re right behind them. At least one of ’em went over the fence and through the house on the other side.”
They went back into the kitchen, and Blacker grabbed Tiffany by the elbow. “We’ve got ’em,” he said. “Come on!”
Tiffany turned back as they left the kitchen. “Sergeant, why don’t you take the rest of these lads and go from door to door? Talk to everybody on this street and make sure the fugitives didn’t come back round. They could be hiding somewhere along here, waiting for us to leave.”
Hammersmith nodded, but once the two inspectors had left, he bent and picked up the pencil from the floor. He took it to the table and stared down at the map. Some of the markings there were in ink or wax crayon, but he saw the fainter trace of graphite here and there. In one place, a pencil had been pushed down against the parchment so hard that it had torn through. Hammersmith leaned forward and stared at the rough loop made by the end of a blunt pencil. Someone had circled a spot in Primrose Hill again and again.
And Hammersmith knew all at once who had drawn the circle on the map. Cinderhouse was not on Phoenix Street or even the next street over. He was on his way to 184 Regent’s Park Road. He was on his way to Walter Day’s house. Day wasn’t at home and Hammersmith was sure he was in no danger. But Claire would be there and she would be alone with young Fiona Kingsley. There was a constable guarding the house, but Hammersmith didn’t know who it was. He couldn’t believe Sir Edward would post someone very good on guard duty. Not during a manhunt.
Hammersmith ran past the parlor, where two constables were busy trying to coax the two tongues into a dirty washbasin with the tips of their truncheons. A third man was there, his back to Hammersmith, apparently supervising the removal of the tongues. He wore a tall black hat and was holding a medical bag. Hammersmith briefly wondered why the doctor hadn’t gone next door to take care of the injured homeowner, why he would override Hammersmith’s own orders regarding the tongues, but he didn’t stop to ask. He banged out through the front door and past the two wagons, the old lady, and the children. He grabbed the bicycle out of the hands of the boy who was still standing by the gate across the street.
“I’m sorry,” he said, “but I need this. I’ll get it back to you straightaway. Tell the inspectors to get someone to Walter Day’s house in Primrose Hill
. That’s where one of the fugitives has gone. Tell them Sergeant Hammersmith is going there now and to meet me there.”
And before the boy could answer or protest, Hammersmith leapt on his bike and pedaled away down the street.
“Well,” Eunice Pye said to the children. “Rude.”
54
Fiona rooted through Claire’s sewing basket, looking for a spool of red thread to match the embroidered names on the coverlet. She had found a spool of white, which she set aside on the small table next to Claire’s chair in the sitting room, but all the other spools were spread across the bottom of the basket underneath fabric remnants and thimbles and cards with needles poked through, and Fiona had to be careful not to stick herself while she looked. There was no rhyme or reason to the way that Claire had stuffed her things into the basket. Fiona needed the white thread in case she had to take apart a seam in order to get the blood out. She’d have to restitch it. And she needed a pair of scissors and the needles, of course. But it was dark down in the basket and Fiona was tempted to upend it onto the table. She could sift through everything on the tabletop, in the bright sunlight streaming through the window, and then shove it all back in the basket. Claire would probably never even know. It was very clear that Claire didn’t spend a lot of time mending things.
Fiona found the scissors just as Rupert Winthrop entered the room behind her. She turned around and saw him staring at the bloody coverlet on the table behind her.
“Took up some water and things,” he said.
“Good.”
“He didn’t say much, the doctor didn’t. Do you think she’s all right?”
“Mrs Day, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“My father’s an excellent doctor. I have every confidence that she’ll be just fine.”
“I do hope so. That don’t look good, though.”
“The coverlet?”
“I mean, is that blood on it?”
“Yes.”
“Is she supposed to bleed?”
“I think a little blood’s okay.” But she didn’t feel at all certain, despite her father’s assurances.
“Your dad’s gonna take care of her?”
“There’s nobody better.”
“Wanted to help her somehow, but didn’t want to intrude during this time, you know. Didn’t know what to do.”
“I’m sure she understands that.”
“I feel useless just sitting there in the hall.”
“Well, you’ve made us all feel safe and protected. So no time wasted.”
“Good of you to say.”
It was good of her to say. In fact, she had nearly forgotten he was in the house. She certainly didn’t need him underfoot. She wanted to get the coverlet cleaned and hung up to dry as quickly as possible so she would be able to stitch Claire’s baby’s name in along the edge of it and present it to her as a gift. Claire would be so pleased.
“I put some more water on to boil,” Rupert said. “And I’ve found all the basins there is in the house, as far as I can tell, miss. It’s really not much. Is there anything I can help you do?”
Fiona looked down at the scissors in her hand and smiled. “As a matter of fact,” she said, “would you be a dear and look through this basket? I need a spool of thread.”
“There’s one right there on the table.”
“That’s white thread, which I do need. But I also need red thread.”
“Are you sure there’s any in that basket?”
“Not at all. But there might be, and I’d like to find it if it’s there.”
“Well, I’ll take a look.”
“That would be wonderful.”
He smiled. “Happy to do it, if it helps.”
“It does. Now I can go clean this up before it sets.”
“Will the blood come out?”
“I certainly hope so.”
“Me, too.”
Fiona picked up the spool of white thread and the coverlet, careful not to perforate it with the tip of the scissors, and went to the door. She peeked back over her shoulder just in time to see the constable pick up the basket and scatter its contents over the tabletop. She sighed and hurried away down the hall to the kitchen.
55
Jack heard someone rush past in the hallway behind him and turned around too late. All he saw was the blue-uniformed back of a policeman. Then the front door banged shut.
“What do we do with these when we get ’em off of here?” one of the constables said.
Jack contemplated the tongues, sagging from their iron nails, dried and no longer vital. He felt a lack of connection to them that surprised him. His trophies had always meant so much.
“Take them back to Scotland Yard,” he said. “Leave them on the desk of Detective Inspector Walter Day. Do you know who that is?”
“Sure,” the other constable said. “I know him. He’ll know what to do with them?”
“Tell him they’re a gift from a new friend.”
The older of the two constables sniffed and rubbed his nose with his thumb. He squinted at Jack, trying to determine whether he was the butt of a joke, whether he ought to laugh.
“The inspector’s probably not at his desk right now,” the younger one said. “Out looking for the escaped prisoners, same as everybody else.”
“Oh, I imagine he’s busy escaping, too. He should be returning to the Yard soon, if he doesn’t lose his leg.”
“Lose his leg?”
“Well, it was dark and I’m not completely sure about the depth of that incision. Still, I’m reasonably confident he’ll be back and in one piece. Please tender my apologies and tell him I hope these offerings will cement our friendship.”
Jack turned and walked away, out of the parlor and out of the house. He heard the constables behind him yelling questions, but paid no attention to them. They were simpletons. He ran his fingers over the bloodred surface of Elizabeth’s door one last time as he passed it. He knew he would not return, but felt little regret. He was done with this place.
There were two wagons in the lane and Jack lingered next to one of them, stroking the horse’s nose, as the old woman who lived next door hurried past and into her own house, leaving her front door standing open.
“How much to take me away from here?” Jack said to the young boy who sat up top, reading a magazine and chewing on the butt of a cigarette.
“Working for the police, mister. This’s their wagon. Can’t go nowhere but where they tell me to go.”
“I’ll give you a quid.”
The boy put down his magazine and squinted at Jack. He straightened the front of his jacket and tossed the cigarette butt into the street. “Where you wanna go, sir?”
“Just a moment, please.”
Jack went around behind the wagon and walked over to the children standing against the short black fence along the opposite side of the street.
“You had a bicycle,” he said to the boy. “Where did it go?”
“Some copper just stole it away from me.”
“He did?”
“Just took it right out of me hands. Didn’t ask or nuffin’.”
“Oh, my. How dreadful.”
“You don’t know how much. That bicycle’s dear. Can’t afford a new one.”
“I’m sure he’ll give it back. He’s a policeman, after all. What was his name?”
“Said it was Hammersmith. Like the place.”
“You don’t say.”
“I do say! Never heard of anybody with that name before.”
“I have. Earlier this very day. It’s a small world, isn’t it?”
“Looks big enough to me.”
“Sergeant Hammersmith didn’t happen to tell you where he was going, did he?”
The boy looked Jack up and down. “He said to tell it to the police, not to any doctors.”
“Oh, but I’m a police doctor.”
“That’s different, then. He said he was going to an inspector’s house. Walter somebod
y. Walter Dew, maybe.”
“Could it have been Walter Day?”
“Yeah, that’s the name. In Primrose Hill.”
“Oh, my, but it is a very small world indeed. Thank you, young man.”
“You’re gonna get my bike back?”
“I doubt very much that I shall remember you by the end of the day. You should look after yourself and get your own bike back. How else will you learn self-reliance?”
Jack turned back to the wagon and climbed in. He patted the side of it with his palm and shouted up to the driver.
“We’re going to Primrose Hill, young man.”
“Where to in Primrose Hill?”
“Just get me to the area and I’ll sort it out from there. Do hurry. I promised a friend I would look in on his wife.”
56
Cinderhouse was careful about his approach. He did not go right up to the front door of the Day house. Instead, he left the road just after he crossed the bridge and traveled through the back gardens of the terrace houses connected to number 184. It was the same way he had left the house with the red door. When he had escaped that house, he’d been worried that Jack might be waiting outside for him. Here, he simply wanted the element of surprise. Day wasn’t as tall as the bald man, but he looked stronger, and Cinderhouse didn’t want to confront him head-on.
He had to climb a fence at the end of the row of homes, and when he fell down on the other side, his jaw bumped against his upper molars and the fresh wound in his mouth sent pain shooting up behind his eyes. He spit blood, wiped his lips on the sleeve of his jacket, and sat for a moment until the pain became bearable. Then he stood and straightened his collar and fixed his resolve. He needed to show Jack that he was capable, that he could follow through with a task. He needed Jack to respect him. And so he needed to kill Walter Day and his wife. It was the logical move to make.
He crept up to the back of number 184 and peered through the small window next to the door. There was a girl in the kitchen whom Cinderhouse took to be the housekeeper. She was filling a basin with water from a big pail. She struggled with the pail because it was heavy and she was quite petite, but she managed to get the water into the basin without spilling much. She added salt to the water and dunked a mass of fabric into the mixture.