The Ghosts of Ardenthwaite (The Northminster Mysteries Book 5)

by Harriet Smart

  “He had a name,” said Baxter.

  “Then tell me it. He was an associate of yours, I think. You both carried the same mark of a swallow, and Kate took it too, to show her love for you. Do I have that right, Mr Hopkins?”

  “That is not my name now.”

  “Johnny Hopkins. Kate told me that was your real name.”

  “What does that matter now? She shouldn’t have said that. She shouldn’t have said anything. The daft – ”

  “She talked to me because she loved you. She wanted to help you.”

  “Loved?” he said, and then made a long, low groan. When he spoke again, he was struggling to speak. “Loved? Is that your news, then, that she is... Because if she talked to you, then she will be –” He turned away from Giles, hunching up his body as his emotions overtook him. “Is she?” he said, turning back to Giles again. “Tell me it isn’t so, tell me!”

  Giles shook his head.

  “I’m sorry, I can’t.”

  “What happened?” Hopkins said, after a long silence.

  “She was stabbed by Bickley or one of his men. You probably know better than I who was responsible for it. I was with her at the end. She did not die alone.”

  “And her blood is on your hands! You made her talk, when you knew what would happen if she did.”

  “No, she chose to talk because of you. She sought me out. She loved you and wanted to help you. She wanted justice for you and the truth to be known.”

  “It’s too bloody late for that. If she is dead and I am dead, what does it matter?”

  “I need your evidence, Mr Hopkins, so that I can send Bickley to the gallows. He deserves it. You know that. You cannot defend him now, not when he has brought you to this place.”

  There was a long pause, then Hopkins wiped his face clear of his tears and said, “He does deserve it. Plenty of times I have thought of doing it myself, just to get clear of him and that life.”

  “Then help me.”

  “We wanted out of it, Matty and Kate and I, that was all. We decided it, and that was the trouble, because once you are in, you can’t get out. These shackles here, this prison here, it’s nothing like that, once you’re in it. Death is the only way out. They get you and that is it.”

  “Matty?”

  “Matty Jones. We were blood brothers. Known him since I was a lad, since I first came to Northminster, and we were in a gang together. Just stealing to stay alive, and then this woman comes along and offers us food and and a decent place to stay, and tells us we are likely boys and we won’t want for anything, if we just do as we are told. And that she’d protect us from your lot.”

  “This was Susan Bickley?”

  “That’s right. The bitch. And she fed us well, and gave us decent clothes, made us learn to read and count, and of course we had to be grateful and do exactly what she wanted, or she sent her brother to thrash the living daylights out of us. So we did what she wanted, and what he wanted. There was always plenty that had to be done.”

  “Such as?”

  “A lot of labouring in the yard. Mucking out horses, that sort of thing, and he taught us to fight. Sometimes we’d have to fight each other, like dogs, and he’d run a book on it. Or we’d have to go with gentlemen, who liked boys better than the whores. Matty more than me, for I wasn’t pretty enough. It wasn’t so bad, because you were never hungry, and I’d been hungry before, and I could stand the work well enough and even thrashings and the dirty gents, after a while. And then when we got to be men, we went out on the main business, collecting the money, and doing what had to be done if they wouldn’t pay.”

  “And you never got a cut?” Giles asked.

  “We got our clothes and our food, as before, and our pick of the whores and liquor as we wanted. But nothing to put away. Nothing to let you build something for yourself. That wasn’t on the cards. Times are I thought of selling my coat and boots and making a dash for it, but that would mean leaving Matty, and then I fell in with Kate and I wanted to make her my wife –” He broke off. “Just like some ordinary lad. I wanted to wed. So that’s when we started to think of it, getting to New York and starting again, while we were still young enough. And so Matty went and talked to Hickman. Oh Christ, I wish he hadn’t. But he said it was the only way to get the tin we needed.”

  “What did he do?”

  “He gave titbits to Hickman. Nothing that could really hurt the Bickleys, but that wasn’t the point. It was the doing of it. But Matty was getting good money from Hickman, real tin, and we were going to go to America, Kate, the three of us. Try our chances in New York!” He laughed bitterly. “New bloody York. What fools we were, to think that we wouldn’t be found out.” His laughter turned to tears again. Eventually he resumed: “I had to kill him. That was my orders, and so I followed my orders, even though I knew it would lead to the gallows. Well, it’s a fool that would disobey Bickley or that bitch of a sister of his. I reckoned I’d rather swing on the racecourse than be cut into a hundred pieces and left in an alley. So I did as as I was told and I killed him. Beat him with a poker until – until –”

  He broke down utterly again.

  When he recovered a little, Giles said,

  “Thank you for being so frank.”

  “It needed to be said,” said Hopkins. “Will it help bring them down?”

  “Yes,” Giles said. “I will need you to repeat it all to one of my men, so it can all be recorded properly.” Hopkins nodded. “Just tell me one more thing – the swallow tattoo – why?”

  “It was Matty’s notion. A mark to bind us, like brothers. We were blood brothers, you see. And I killed him and he died knowing it.”

  -o-

  Giles returned to the Northern Office, and had been in his office for no more than ten minutes when he heard the sound of Tom’s voice in the outer office. He was a trifle out of breath.

  “I must speak to my unc – I mean, Major Vernon, at once!”

  Giles came out from his room.

  “Yes?”

  “I found this –” said Tom rushing forward. “At the Ice House in the Bishop’s Park. It’s his, I’m sure of it!”

  He thrust it at Giles. It was a white handkerchief, heavily stained with blood.

  “It has his initial on it,” Tom added, pointing to the corner where a clumsy ‘E’ had been embroidered with some labour but little success. A present from one of his little sisters, Giles thought.

  “Let’s show this to Mr Carswell,” he said.

  -o-

  The ice house was set in a distant corner of the park, conveniently located for the river and a footbridge to the race ground beyond. Lying in a secluded, almost invisible hollow, it was evident that it had not been in use as an ice house for some years, and the top of the mound was heavy with brambles and ivy. However, the rusty gate opened with ease and when Tom led them down the tunnel and into the domed chamber, it was obvious that it had been used for other purposes than storing ice. There was a distinct tang of urine in the air, and the walls were decorated with obscene drawings created with smoking candles.

  “And where did you find the handkerchief?” Major Vernon said.

  “Here, by the wall,” said Tom. “I put that stone there to mark the spot.”

  “Excellent work,” said Felix, squatting down, a candle in his hand and peering at the floor. But there was little of interest to be seen.

  “Here’s something,” said Major Vernon who was making his own survey. “A cigar stub, I think. But that proves nothing in itself.”

  Felix went and examined it.

  “It looks quite recent,” said Felix. “And there is a scrap of the band left here. That means it’s an expensive one, from Cuba.”

  “Bad habits have their uses,” said Major Vernon with a smile. “So we might be able to identify where it was bought?”

  “Certainly. I think the place I buy my cheroots in St Anne’s Street might have them.”

  “And you and Edmund weren’t in the habit of smoking
expensive Cuban cigars down here, Tom?” said Major Vernon, taking a sheet of paper from his notebook and folding the cigar stub up inside it.

  “Of course not!” said Tom, and then realised he was being teased. “Oh, I see. No.”

  “Who knows what has gone on in here over the years,” Major Vernon said. “I think the Bishop ought to invest in a lock for the gate.”

  They emerged from the ice house and Major Vernon stood scanning the landscape.

  “Tom, that path goes up into the woods there, does it not? Where does it come out?”

  “By the summer house,” said Tom.

  “You know this place like the back of your hand,” said Felix.

  “We have always treated it as if it was our own,” said Tom. “The old Bishop was quite happy that we should.”

  “So, in theory, if Edmund had been at the summer house,” Major Vernon said, “and was running away from something unpleasant, he might have come that way, perhaps in order to hide at the ice house?”

  “Yes,” said Tom. “That’s why I showed it to him in the first place because it is a good spot for that. And that’s why I went looking for him there.”

  “Now, please, don’t take this amiss, Tom,” said Major Vernon. “You have been a great help to us and to Edmund, but I am sending you home now, and you are to stay there until further notice.”

  “Must I?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  Tom left, albeit, reluctantly.

  “That sounded rather grave,” Felix said as they took the path down to the river and the footbridge.

  “It was a precaution,” said Major Vernon. “I don’t want him with us if we turn up anything –”

  He broke off and left the path to go down to the river bank, where the grass had been worn away to form a small, muddy beach. “There would be no problem bringing a boat alongside here, wouldn’t you say?”

  “To what end?” Felix said, joining him at the water’s edge.

  “To remove someone discreetly.”

  “Are you subscribing to the abduction theory now, sir?” said Felix.

  “It is easier to tell the truth than lie,” said Major Vernon. “Perhaps that was a partial truth from Mrs Hughes. He has been abducted, someone has told her so, and she can therefore speak with perfect sincerity about it.”

  “Bickley, you mean? He has told her that he has taken her own son and she has acquiesced to it? That cannot be right, not even to save her reputation, surely?”

  “Bickley has made a fortune from intimidation. It is his modus operandi. And she appears to be emotionally and perhaps physically in his thrall – after all, who knows what Edmund may have seen when he blundered into the summer house. A woman in such a state might agree to anything.”

  “So what do you think happened?”

  “Edmund has been removed somewhere. I think he ran away to the ice house. Perhaps Bickley came after him and gave him a good hiding, possibly to the point of leaving him unconscious. Or worse, God forbid – but we must be clear about what we are dealing with here. So the boat is fetched to remove Edmund in whatever state he might be in, and Bickley tells Mrs Hughes that he has been abducted, perhaps for his own good.”

  “So the boy could be anywhere,” said Felix looking downriver to the towers and chimneys of Northminster, wreathed in grey smoke and the looming dusk. “Alive or dead.”

  “If he is dead, then Bickley could use him to frame Hickman,” said Major Vernon. “If he’s alive, he is being battered into silence somewhere. And then perhaps Bickley intends to ‘find him’ and restore him to his mother, proving what a saint he is. I don’t like either theory. I wish he had just run off to cut loose, but I don’t think that is the case. Come, let us go and see if that cigar stub can help us.”

  -o-

  They made various enquiries, but with little success. Then, as they were walking back toward the Northern Office, a carriage drew up alongside them, the window was pulled down and a woman looked out and addressed Major Vernon.

  “Oh, Mr Peters, it is you!” she said. “I thought it was, but I wasn’t sure – but it is! How very fortunate!”

  “Can I help you, ma’am?”

  “I don’t know – perhaps. I was going to the Infirmary to get a surgeon. There is a young Scotsman there, I understand, who is very talented.”

  “Mr Frazer?” said Major Vernon.

  “Oh, is that his name?” she said. “I didn’t know. Do you know him?”

  “Oh yes, ma’am, in fact, you are in luck. It is this gentleman here with me. May I present Mr Frazer, Miss Bickley?”

  “Goodness! How extremely fortunate. Sir, could you possibly spare an hour or two? I have a poor soul under my roof in dire need of professional attention.”

  “Of course, ma’am,” said Felix, trying not to sound too astonished at the mention of this name.

  “Then we had better go at once,” said Major Vernon, opening the carriage door and propelling Felix inside. He found himself sitting opposite the woman while Major Vernon sat down beside her. “You do not object to my coming too, ma’am? I may be able to help in some small way.”

  “Not at all,” she said. “How kind you are, sir.”

  They drove at some speed to Marlingford and arrived at the Manor House a little after five.

  A respectable old manservant was there to open the door to them, and they went into an ancient panelled hall, well-lit with candles.

  “How is he?” Miss Bickley asked the butler. “This is Mr Frazer, the surgeon. Do everything he tells you, Stevens.”

  “Of course, ma’am. He’s no better, no worse. Rose is with him,” said Stevens.

  “This way, if you please, Mr Frazer,” said Miss Bickley, starting to climb the stairs. He followed her up and then along the passageway into a large, comfortable bedroom. Here, lying in the canopied bed, was a slight boy. It was Edmund Hughes.

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Carswell glanced back at Giles with an expression of surprise mixed with confusion. It was clear that he recognised the boy, and that given the circumstances, the boy could only be Edmund Hughes.

  He appeared to be in a wretched state, his face black with bruises. Carswell began to examine him at once, and Miss Bickley seemed inclined to hover at his side, like the most tender and anxious of relatives.

  “We should leave him to his work, ma’am,” said Giles to Miss Bickley. “Yes, Frazer?”

  Carswell waved them away, and Giles led Miss Bickley out of the room and closed the door. They stood in silence on the passageway for a moment.

  “You are right,” she said after a moment. “It’s just I am fearful for him. He looks so delicate.”

  “And how did he come to be here?” he asked.

  “Perhaps we should go downstairs?” she said, clearly not ready to give her answer.

  She took him into a pleasant sitting room and ordered tea to be brought in. If he had known nothing of her background, seeing her presiding over her tea table, in her comfortable sitting room tastefully furnished with old pieces, he might have taken her good sense and respectability entirely at face value. Even the well-behaved pair of terriers, who lay curled up in their basket near her chair, spoke of it. It was hard to believe that it was been built on a sordid base of brothel-keeping, crooked card games, slave labour, intimidation, fraud and usury.

  “It’s a curious business,” she said, when she had sat down by the fire, and taken one of the dogs onto her lap. “I don’t quite know how to begin to explain it. But I think I may rely on your discretion?”

  He sat down opposite, wondering how he should respond. He sensed she knew exactly who the boy was, and why it was important. At the same time he felt even more sure that she knew he was not Mr Peters.

  “Of course,” he said, and saw her smile, and felt this confirmed that she did not want him to be discreet. She wanted the facts on the table.

  “How well do you know my brother?” she said.

  “Not as well as I would like.”<
br />
  “I am glad you do not know him well,” she said. “Oh, Mr Peters, I’m so ashamed of him, I cannot begin to tell you!” She sighed and glanced away.

  There was certainly a talent for theatricals in this family, Giles thought, leaning back in his chair and considering her words.

  “His misdeeds will not taint you, surely?” said Giles.

  “Oh, I hope not,” she said. “But he has done such terrible, terrible things. That poor boy – ”

  “You think your brother assaulted him?”

  “I am sure of it. He did not deny it, after all.”

  “You’ve spoken to him about it?”

  “I was down at the brickfields. It is a joint venture of ours and I had gone to speak to him about a point of business. It was only by chance I saw the lad. He had left him lying on a pile of sacks in a store room, having, it seemed, vented his anger upon him.”

  “Did your brother say who he was?”

  “He implied that he was the Bishop’s son. How he came to be at the brickfield is another matter entirely. I fear that there is some sordid intrigue behind all this! Of course, I tried to find out what his intentions were, but George would tell me nothing. In fact we had a most disagreeable scene.”

  “And how came the boy to be in your care? I am surprised you were allowed to remove him.”

  “It was only by chance that I could – a merciful chance. George was called away to town on business and I was able to take him then. Fortunately I have some authority with his men. If I had not been able to rescue him, I dread to think what might have happened to him.”

  “Do you think it was his intention to leave the boy to die?”

  “I rather fear so. I suppose he knows something that he should not.”

  “He is in good hands with Mr Frazer.”

  “There have been too many deaths already,” she said, “I could not bear another. This must stop now. I think you understand me, sir?”

  He nodded, then ventured, “You think your brother has other blood on his hands?”

  “Yes. I hoped it was not true, of course, but I fear –”

  “Was he provoked in some way?” Giles asked, wondering what she might say about Hickman.