by David Ashton
Luckily, given his internal tribulation, Stevenson saw nothing of this, but he could hear horses neighing, reins jingling, and the sound drove him deeper under the covers.
Full fathom five thy father lies;
Of his bones are coral made:
Those are pearls that were his eyes
The Watcher across the street observed the principal funeral carriage, four black horses tossing their heads, the coffin behind glass, a solid burnished casket, brass gleaming in the pale sunlight, for the weather had relented somewhat upon this momentous day.
Other carriages ranged behind all the way down Heriot Row stretching back to Abercrombie Place, horses stamping their hooves, whinnying and whickering, steam rising from their flanks, for it was a good day to raise a gallop.
Sadly they were all headed for the New Calton Burying Ground, where galloping was not the norm.
None of this interested the Watcher.
He had eyes only for the carriage directly behind the funeral coach.
A murmur from some spectators – the assemblage had attracted a curious crowd – signalled figures emerging from number 17.
Bob Stevenson, a tall elegant gentleman, cousin of Robert, took the lead with the widow Margaret, wife of the departed Thomas, veiled from vulgar scrutiny, holding firmly to his manly arm.
Another couple followed.
Fanny Osbourne, striking features obscured by the swaddling clothes of mourning, had her arm equally firmly hooked into the elbow crook of a tall, thin fellow with a lean and hungry face.
But it was not him !
Lloyd Osbourne, the woman’s son. A usurper. Imposter.
And not him!
The carriage was entered, both men ensuring the delicate sex to be safely ensconced before Lloyd followed suit; then Bob Stevenson walked to the funeral carriage and gravely – as befitted the privileged status of Chief Mourner – spoke quietly to the coachman.
The vehicle jolted into motion, then cousin Bob swung lithely into the family coach with undeniable elegance, and off went the procession.
Minus the one who must be found.
The Watcher also moved, for he had business to pursue and duties to observe, but would return with time to spare.
He had no plan as such but he could feel the powers gathering within.
Fate.
Destiny.
Finally in hand.
Like a silver cane.
Chapter 41
Out of the mouths of very babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength, because of thine enemies.
The Bible, Psalms
Mulholland entered the station to find bedlam, as various self-important citizens gathered round the ominously still figure of Lieutenant Roach. The more sensible fathers, who had decided their sons deserved what they got and hell mend them, were no doubt occupied with affairs of commerce, but there were enough paternal petitioners, with various lawyers at hand, to keep the pot boiling.
The new arrival towered over the swarming crowd, caught Roach’s gaze from the back, and was gratified to see that there was a certain flinty obduracy to his superior that did not bode well for the hectoring horde, had they but the wit to realise it.
Mulholland skirted the edges and slid in behind his beleaguered commander, signalling up one of the constables, Ewan Sinclair, a hefty specimen who sported the mid-burgeoning of a prize keeker from the student rammy.
Folk high, low, lawful or otherwise often took Mulholland for a soft mark, due to smooth skin and blue eyes, but these latter were like chips of ice as he trained them on the nearest combatants. With the bruised but hulking figure of Sinclair looming up on the other side, the two caused more than a little unease, as if arrest were merely waiting in the wings.
When policemen gather, no-one stands safe.
A silence fell, or rather there was a cessation of clamour and Roach took full advantage. Mind you, to be truthful, though it was useful to have men at each arm, he would not in fact have been disquieted to face the yammering host on his own, for he had awoken that morning and announced to his wife – enough is enough!
Mistress Roach lay unsure whether this referred to their marriage, the opera, or life in general. She had little chance to question her husband further, because he levered himself out of bed, donned slippers, struggled into a far from flamboyant dressing gown, then stalked off to the dining room where two cold, hard boiled eggs and a small mound of salt awaited the pleasure of his company.
The memory of those eggs, smoothly composed behind the shell, now sustained him.
He took a deep breath.
Robert Roach was about to make a speech of sorts.
‘Your offspring,’ he began crisply, ‘have broken the peace and assaulted my officers. If by chance you harbour any doubts, please look around you.’
Indeed throughout the station many a plastered eyebrow, bandaged jaw, and discoloured cheekbone was manifest, in addition to the afore-mentioned bruised keeker.
‘The injuries caused have not so far threatened life, though who knows what complications may ensue, but at least two of my men have had to be dispatched to the infirmary.’
Like so much in life, factually accurate yet not quite true.
Ballantyne had indeed been sent to the nearest hospital, but that was because his mother worked there as head nurse, and since the station cupboard had run short of supplies the constable had been instructed to scrounge what he could in the way of salves, plasters and bandages.
Sinclair, despite being a Highlander with little sense of urban direction, had been posted along to make sure the other did not get lost in the dark.
They had returned laden with contraband, and while Ballantyne basked in the unaccustomed acclaim, the young constable was somewhat reserved, as if something was on his mind.
Of course none of these supplies was passed through to the equally bruised and battered students in the cells.
The force looks after its own.
Only natural.
‘In view of the severity of physical damage incurred by my officers in pursuance of their duty,’ Roach continued, ‘I have no option but to press charges, and I will do so without fear or favour!’
In fact there was no pretext to this attitude; the lieutenant had seethed through the whole night and opened his eyes to a fury cold as the boiled eggs.
This was a violent affray, lives could have been lost, especially those of his own foot-soldiers, and it would be a mistake to think that the rigid cast of his normal demeanour encased a heart of pure stone.
These were his men.
Not the cream of the crop perhaps, but they had laid their bodies on the line for justice.
Spoiled brats notwithstanding.
One of the loudest supplicants for these whippersnappers, a man who shared the same Lodge as the lieutenant and mistakenly presumed this to give him some edge, being of a higher Masonic rank than Roach, stuck his florid countenance to the fore, with what he took to be a valid and unanswerable complaint.
His business was tobacco – the more yellow smoke the populace drew into their lungs, the richer he waxed.
‘I spoke with my son – he has been bitten by fleas all night!’
‘Let us hope the fleas survive,’ said Roach dryly.
‘How dare you allow this to happen?’
‘I might ask you the same question,’ was the unyielding response.
‘If you break the law, sir,’ remarked Mulholland, ‘you take the consequence. All or nothing.’
The demanding throng suddenly became aware of an ominous stillness, not only from the three facing. When they glanced around the other constables were ranged throughout the station, obviously in attention, and, to a man, facing directly towards the contending parties.
It is always wise to look behind – it may be only a shadow, but something will always be on your trail.
Roach pitched his voice a little louder, aware of a wider audience.
‘I will not have my men assaulted by
a rabble who fondly imagine themselves to be privileged above justice and I will press charges – as previously stated and at the risk of repeating myself – without fear or favour!’
Then a smile crossed his face for the first time.
Wintry, but a smile.
‘Furthermore it is my pleasure to inform you that this will be heard in court within the next few days, and that the presiding official will be Sheriff Hunter.’
An indrawn breath from the lawyers present.
Hunter was a nuggety little man, fierce in the sentence, who would snap a legal head from its shoulders, who was no lover of Masonic ritual; not a man who might view student revels as a gay whirl.
A bushy-eyebrowed, granite nemesis.
‘If you wish your clients or progeny released on surety of bail, Sergeant Murdoch will be attending at the desk with relevant forms. I will then decide each case on its intrinsic merit.’
Now the smile was more that of a crocodile.
‘It will be a long day, gentlemen. Goodbye.’
As the disconsolate pack headed towards the desk where Murdoch, whose blood coursed at a speed that would put a sloth to shame, waited, Roach dismissed Sinclair with a nod of thanks and addressed himself to Mulholland.
‘And where is McLevy, if I may be so bold?’
‘The inspector dispatched me post-haste to bring you the latest developments, sir.’
‘You mean he’s up to something he doesn’t want me to know about or you to witness?’
‘That would be about the fist of it.’
The constable then, as directed, brought Roach up to date with what had been gleaned from the Just Land. Sadly not a great deal, in that he had been unable to find any footmarks, and a thorough examination on both sides of the garden wall had produced nothing either.
The killer had come and gone, leaving not a trace behind.
Save on the body of Jean Brash.
‘You begin to wonder if the man is somehow anointed with the devil’s luck,’ muttered Roach.
‘Had crossed my mind.’
‘But no. He is of this earth and we will find him.’
‘I hope so,’ Mulholland replied, the memory of his inspector’s grim figure disappearing into the pale light of a treacherous May sun with hardly a word of farewell clear in his mind.
‘I take it the Mistress of the Just Land will survive?’
‘Not by too much. It was a vile attack.’
The lieutenant shook his head in frustration.
‘Could she identify the man?’
‘No. Neither from the past, in the present, nor might she recognise him in the future.’
‘She could supply no reason for the assault?’
‘According to the inspector, not a one.’
Roach almost stamped his feet in temper, such was the irritation, for he had something rustling in his inside pocket like a canker on the skin.
And his small victory was over.
‘Surely there must be some motive that links these three crimes?’
‘That’s what I keep telling myself.’
Mulholland’s face gave nothing away, but he had a notion that McLevy was brooding to some effect.
Or was the constable just grasping at straws?
Like his inspector.
The lieutenant cast a bleak glance over the station.
‘When word of this latest depredation gets out on the streets, there will be no place to hide.’
He then fished something out of his jacket pocket.
‘Here – just to cheer you up.’
It was a folded copy of the Leith Herald, morning edition, with yet another flaming accusation.
WHERE IS THE KILLER? HE LAUGHS AT THE POLICE!
Their visit to Carnegie had not obviously discouraged the man from flaunting his banner headlines.
As Mulholland read on, Roach tapped a long bony finger to indicate a worrying sub-heading.
Rumours of another killing. What is being concealed?
‘I hope to God McLevy can pull a rabbit out the hat,’ muttered Roach. ‘We are running out of time.’
The lieutenant cast an eye over the crowd at the desk, which had not diminished one jot, as Murdoch licked his thumb and laboriously separated one sheet from another.
‘A minor triumph,’ he said soberly. ‘Compared to what is coming. You can keep the paper.’
Roach then disappeared into his room, leaving Mulholland a little bereft.
The constable had been, in truth, taken aback at McLevy’s sudden departure, though it was certainly not the first time his inspector had pursued his own ends.
But now, for the life of him, Mulholland could not think quite where to direct his own steps.
All the other constables had returned to their various tasks save Ballantyne, who was gazing his way with a strange expression on his face.
Mulholland glanced once more at the paper; it did not make pretty reading, so he hurled it into the nearest wastepaper-basket and, for want of something better to do, stalked over to the constable’s desk.
For a change there were no insects, dead or otherwise, on the surface as the young man averted his eyes, birth mark pulsing – a sure sign of emotional upheaval.
‘Is something bothering you, Ballantyne?’
The constable nodded.
‘McWhirter,’ he replied.
‘You’ll have to help me here,’ muttered Mulholland, telling himself for the umpteenth time he was dealing with a strange labyrinth of a mind, and that howling abuse or wrenching the boy up by the scruff of the neck would not help matters.
‘My mammy told me. Last night. In confidence.’
‘Go on.’
‘An auld woman. Wi’ bellythraw. McWhirter.’
‘Well enough named,’ said Mulholland. ‘I know you’ll get there eventually, Ballantyne, but if you wouldn’t mind while the Queen still reigns.’
‘Wind mostly,’ was the response. ‘An auld woman. Frae the church. St Stephens.’
A bell of sorts rang in Mulholland’s mind. There were two old biddies who had entered the church along with the minister’s wife, and was not one of them named McWhirter?
They had been questioned right enough, but though both McLevy and he had the impression the dead woman was not universally popular, lips were locked tight and holy praise won the day.
‘She knew Agnes Carnegie,’ Ballantyne said, as if confirming the other’s line of thought. ‘And Agnes tellt the auld woman something about her son. No’ very nice.’
‘Sadly,’ rejoined Mulholland, wondering if he should go and lie down somewhere, ‘Sim Carnegie has an alibi for the murder night.’
‘It’s been on her conscience. She should have told ye. But dirty linen. When she saw me last night, wi’ my uniform and my mammy told her . . . ’
Here Ballantyne looked abashed.
‘Told her what?’
‘That I was . . . a son tae . . . stick by his mother. The auld woman tellt her. And my mammy tellt me. In confidence.’
‘And you’re worried about breaking that confidence. The patient to the nurse, the nurse to her son?’
‘A wee bit.’
Finally they had reached the goal, and Mulholland had a reasoned response to the constable’s misgivings.
‘Nothing is private where the law is concerned, Ballantyne. Now spit it out!’
And the constable did.
Some ten minutes later, when Roach opened his office door to see the continuing stasis at Murdoch’s desk, he noted the absence of these two men.
Without so much as a by-your-leave.
And McLevy gone as well.
He tried to rid himself of the feeling of being a sinking ship, with rats streaming off in all directions.
He closed the door again and looked at Victoria on the wall.
Only the Queen holds true.
Everything else is fabrication.
Chapter 42
Stop and consider! life is but a day;
; A fragile dew-drop on its perilous way.
Keats, ‘Sleep and Poetry’
Another vile dream and Stevenson wrenched out of it basted with perspiration.
His father and he had been astride a log, floating on dark, deep water, paddles to hand.
It seemed to be an underground cavern, with pale clay walls, and the sinuous current bore them onward with little effort on their behalf.
Thomas was at the back, old and frail, but accoutred in his Sunday best, a fierce expression of determination on his face. Louis had only a shirt for covering, dangling legs bare, and he sported a nightcap with some foolish bobble on the end, which obscured his vision as it danced in front.
There was a feeling of menace in the dark waters, and various large, snakelike shapes swam near the surface, now and again breaking surface and disclosing flat, reptilian heads with sickly yellow eyes that seemed not to focus on the paddling pair, as if they were of no interest.
The heads then dipped below again, but the malevolent ripples that spread on the viscous tide showed the length of the creatures.
Stevenson’s naked legs were freezing in the flow, but his father seemed unaffected, stout Sabbath serge repelling all evil machinations.
‘You are the lawful son!’
This strong shout from Thomas echoed and bounced off the cavern walls, before disappearing behind as the motion of the water drove them onwards.
The lawful son, the lawful son, the lawful son.
Robert Louis tried to nod his head in acknowledgement, but the nightcap slipped over his eyes and disaster struck.
He had been guiding from the front, but this temporary blindness caused him to steer the log into a treacherous rock, black and slimy, sticking part out of the water like a knife. The log struck with a bone-shaking blow and the jolt skewed the primitive craft sideways so that, agonisingly slowly, Thomas began to slip from the rough bark.
‘A lighthouse! See the need!’
As his father howled and pointed, the log now travelling sideways while both scrabbled desperately to hold firm, the writer jerked his head round to see a pure white structure looming out of the darkness ahead.