“Indeed? And who might the gentlemen be? We were not introduced.”
“I don’t doubt it. That’s me stomach binder yer using fer a rag.”
I stood up. “Merciful heavens, I think I’ve paid you for it.”
She faced me unsmiling, no cheery robin chirp in her manner or voice today, no “duckie” for me. She said, “Wot ye gave me went to the neighbours. Others who saw.”
This, I realised, must be partly true. She had disappeared from the doorway to bargain with bystanders for their silence.
But by the shrewd glint in her eye I knew it was also partly false. She had promised the neighbours some shillings or a few pounds at the very most.
Still, there was something honest in the grimness of her face as she told me, “There’d best be more where that came from. Cutter would slice me inside out if he knew, make no mistake about it. It’s my life I’m risking fer ye.”
“If you provide what we need,” I told her, “there will be more.”
So it was that the next day Tewky and I slipped out of her shop by the back door, strengthened and transformed. We had taken refuge in her rather slovenly kitchen—for she lived in three rooms on the first floor, over the shop—and we had accepted her lumpy porridge gratefully. We had slept, I on her foul-smelling sofa, Tewky on quilts on her floor. We had taken sponge baths. We had applied bag balm (ointment for cow udders) to Tewky’s feet, then wrapped them in bandages. We had outfitted ourselves in apparel from Culhane’s Used Clothing, burning our old things in the kitchen stove.
We had not talked, not even to tell one another our names. Our sour-faced hostess had asked us no questions, and we had offered no information. Tewky and I did not even converse between ourselves, lest she overhear. I did not trust her; I would not have put it beyond her to separate me from all of my money if she discovered where I kept it. Therefore I never removed my clothing in her presence, and I never removed my corset at all, not even to sleep. That once-despised garment had become my most precious possession—so long as I did not actually tighten it! Its steely protection had saved my life. Its starchy structure supported and concealed the bust enhancer, dress improver, and hip regulators that disguised both me and my financial means.
I believe and hope that Mrs. Culhane—if that was indeed her name—never discovered this secret. We spoke only to conduct business: Might her shop provide a suit of clothes not too much worn for the boy, and a cap, and an ample pair of shoes, and thick socks? And for me, a blouse, and a bustled or gored skirt such as a typist or glove-counter girl might wear, made of practical material, with pockets? And a jacket, also with pockets, its hem flared to fit over the top of the skirt? And gloves not too spoilt, and a hat not too far out of fashion, and would she give me a bit of help with my hair?
I felt naked to the eyes of the world, leaving that place without my thick black widow’s veil to cover my face, but the truth was that even my own brothers might not have known me. I stooped, and peered nearsightedly through “pince-nez” eyeglasses clipped onto my nose, perched there like a bizarre metal bird. Over the eyeglasses, a considerable fringe of false hair both decorated and hid my forehead, assisting the pince-nez in altering my profile. And over the hair I wore a straw hat trimmed with bits of lace and feathers, very much like any cheap straw hat worn by any struggling young woman in the city.
“Now I just need a parasol,” I told Mrs. Culhane.
She gave me one dyed a hideous but stylish chemically derived green, then escorted us to her back door and held out her hand. Upon her palm I placed, as I had promised, another bank note. We exited, and she closed the door behind us without a word.
Once we had achieved the street, I shuffled as I walked, acting half blind, feeling my way with the folded parasol. I did this partly as disguise, and partly so that Tewky, whose feet were still quite sore, would not appear to struggle along, but rather to walk slowly, accompanying me, for my sake. In our clothing neither new nor worn-out, neither rich nor poor, I hoped we would escape anyone’s attention, for I wanted no one bearing news of us to Cutter.
But I need not have worried. All around us, folk went noisily about their business, taking no notice of us at all. London, that great brick-and-stone cauldron of a city, seemed always on the boil with swirling human activity. A man with a barrow cried, “Ginger beer! Fresh cold ginger beer to cool yer dusty throat!” A water-cart trundled past, followed by boys cleaning the cobbles with brooms. A delivery man pedalled by on the oddest tricycle I had ever seen, with the two wheels to the front instead of the rear, and a great box strapped to the handle-bars. On a corner stood three dark-haired children singing in harmony like angels, in a language I did not know, the middle one with a crockery cup extended for my penny. Just beyond and above them, a ragged man with a paste can and brush balanced on a ladder, sticking up advertisements for shoe blacking, anti-rheumatic elastic wrappings, patent safety coffins. Men in white sack jackets and white trousers nailed a quarantine notice onto the doorway of a lodging. I wondered briefly what vile fevers and diseases wafted up from the stinking Thames, and whether I would perish of cholera or scarlet fever for having set foot on Cutter’s vessel.
Cutter. Charming ruffian. In one of my pockets, along with money and various other useful items I had transferred there from my bust enhancer, I carried a list I had written in some wakeful hours during the night:
Why did Cutter search the train?
Why did he follow me?
Why did he think I knew where to find Tewky?
What did he want with Tewky?
Why did he wire Squeaky to look for Tewky on the docks?
What did he mean when he said “much the same”?
Is he in the business of kidnapping?
How did he know anything about Tewky and the Great Eastern at all?
How, indeed? I had told Inspector Lestrade. And Madame what-was-her-name, the Astral Perditorian, had overheard.
Had Inspector Lestrade told others? Perhaps, eventually, but would he not first have taken steps to confirm my information? Yet that wire must have been sent to Squeaky almost immediately.
Hmm.
Such were my thoughts as my limping escort and I walked a few blocks to a better neighborhood. Here we found a park of sorts, a patch of grass with four trees under which women trundled prams and a man with a donkey cried, “Rides, treat yer kiddies, a penny a head.” Beside the park, I saw, stood a number of cabs. I would be able to hire one so my little lordship would not have to walk on his suffering feet.
So far, much on our guard, we had not spoken at all, but now that we had left Cutter’s haunts behind, I turned to my companion and smiled.
“Well, Tewky,” I said.
“Don’t call me that.”
I bristled. “Very well, Lord Tewksbury of Basilwether-or-not—” But my annoyance subsided as a thought struck me. I asked, “What do you want to be called? What name had you chosen for yourself when you ran off?”
“I—” He shook his head and turned his face away. “Never mind. It doesn’t matter anymore.”
“Why? What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you still want to go to sea?”
He swivelled to stare at me. “You know everything. How do you know so much? Who are you? Are you really related to Sherlock Holmes?”
I bit my lip, for I did not feel as if it would be safe to tell him anything more of myself; already he knew too much. Luckily, at that moment a newsboy howled from the corner by the cab-stand, “Read all about it! Ransom demand for Viscount Tewksbury Basilwether!”
“What?” I exclaimed. “That’s preposterous!” Almost forgetting to peer and shuffle, I scuttled over and bought a newspaper.
SENSATIONAL DEVELOPMENT IN
KIDNAPPING CASE
read the headline over, once again, Tewky’s portrait à la Little Lord Fauntleroy.
Sitting next to me on a park bench so that we could both see the newspaper at once, Tewky made a
muffled sound of dismay. “My picture?”
“The whole world has viewed it,” I told him with, I admit, some degree of zest. Then, as he did not immediately reply, I glanced at him to see upon his face an expression of fiery red, utterly anguished humiliation.
“I can’t go back,” he said. “I’ll never go back.”
No longer gleeful, I asked, “But what if someone recognises the picture? Mrs. Culhane, for instance?”
“She? When ever would she look at a newspaper? She can’t read. In those slums nobody can read. Did you see any newsboys at the docks?”
He was right, of course, but rather than admit it, I devoted my attention to the text of the article:
A most surprising turn of events took place this morning with the arrival of an unsigned ransom demand at Basilwether Hall, Belvidere, scene of the recent disappearance of Viscount Tewksbury, Marquess of Basilwether. Despite Chief Inspector Lestrade’s most astute discovery of the young lord’s cache of nautical paraphernalia in a treetop hideaway—
“Oh, no,” Tewky whispered, anguished anew.
Wincing, I read on without comment.
—and his subsequent energetic inquiries at the London docks, where he located several eyewitnesses who claimed to have seen the missing youngster upon the very day of his disappearance—
Which was, I realised, just one day after that of my own disappearance. So much had happened since, it was hard to believe that only three days ago, I had left Ferndell Hall.
—it would now appear that the Viscount, heir to the Basilwether title and fortune, has indeed been kidnapped. Delivered in the morning post, a brief missive pasted together out of letters cut from periodicals demanded a large sum, the amount of which the family desires to remain undisclosed. Lacking any proof that Lord Tewksbury has indeed fallen into the hands of this unknown individual or individuals, the authorities advise against paying the ransom. Famed Medium and Astral Perditorian Madame Laelia Sibyl de Papaver, however, called in by the Basilwether family at the onset of the crisis, advises most strongly that the ransom, which is to be gathered in the form of gold sovereigns and guineas pending instructions for delivery, should be paid, as her communications with spiritual manifestations advise her that Viscount Tewksbury is indeed held captive and in danger of his very life unless the kidnappers receive the full cooperation of his family. Madame Laelia . . .
There was more, but at this point I ceased reading. Instead, I sat staring at—at the cab-stand, really. That was what stood before Tewky and me: sporty hansom cabs and clumsy but more roomy four-wheelers, glossy horses and scrawny horses swishing their tails while munching on nosebags of oats, portly cabdrivers and shabby cabdrivers loitering, waiting for fares. But I was not in fact seeing any of this. I was trying to remember what Madame Laelia had looked like, but so much had happened in the past three days that I retained only an impression of red hair, large face, large body, large hands in yellow kid gloves—
A small voice said, “I have to go back.”
It took me a moment to turn and focus on Tewky, pale and handsome and very young, returning my gaze.
“I have to go home,” he said. “I can’t let those bloody villains steal from my family.”
I nodded. “You have an idea who sent the ransom note, then.”
“Yes.”„
“And you imagine, as I do, that they are still upon the hunt for you.”
“For both of us. Yes, indeed.”
“We’d better go to the police.”
“I suppose so.” But his glance slid away.
He studied the tips of his new shoes—new only in a sense, as they had all too clearly been cobbled together from pieces of leather scavenged from old boots.
I waited.
Finally he said, “It wasn’t what I expected, anyway. The shipyards, I mean. The water is filthy. So are the people. They don’t like one if one tries to stay clean. They think one is a snob. Even the beggars spit on one. Somebody stole my money, my boots, even my stockings. Some people are so mean, they would even steal from the crawlers.”
“The crawlers?”
“Dosses, they call them, because they’re always dozing. I’ve never seen any persons so wretched.” His voice lowered. “Old women with nothing left, not even strength to stand on their feet. They sit on the workhouse steps, half asleep but with nowhere to lay their heads, too nearly dead even to beg. And if someone gives them a penny to buy tea, they crawl away to get it.”
With a shock to my heart I remembered the hairless old woman I had seen crawling on the pavement, her head all sores.
“And then they crawl back again,” Tewky said, his voice lower and more struggling by the moment. “And there they sit. Three times a month they are allowed a meal and a night’s sleep in the workhouse. Three times. If they ask for more than that, they are locked up and given three days at hard labour.”
“What? But I thought the workhouse was supposed to help the unfortunate.”
“I thought that, too. I went there to ask for shoes, and they . . . they laughed at me and hit me with a stick. Drove me away. And then . . . that nasty man . . .”
His memories of Squeaky made his eyes water. He ceased speaking.
“I’m glad you’ve decided to go home,” I said after a moment. “Your mother will be overjoyed to see you. She’s been crying, you know.”
He nodded, accepting without question that I would know this, as I seemed to know everything else.
“I’m sure you’ll be able to make her understand you can’t wear those Lord Fauntleroy clothes anymore.”
He said very softly, “Whatever kind of clothes, it doesn’t matter. I never knew . . .”
He didn’t finish. But I believe he was still thinking about the dosses, poor half-alive old women who crawled. Or perhaps about bare, sore feet, and the waterfront, and Squeaky, and being kicked like a dog.
Two days in London had made me aware, too, of much that I had not known before.
And now that I did know, my own ill fortunes seemed small enough.
I stood up and hailed a cab. An open, hansom cab; I wanted us to go in style. Tewky gave me his hand like a gentleman as I climbed in, as I directed the driver, “To Scotland Yard.”
CHAPTER THE FIFTEENTH
QUITE ASIDE FROM ACCOMPANYING TEWKY, I had my own errand at Scotland Yard.
“This is lovely!” exclaimed Tewksbury, scanning London from the hansom cab as the horse trotted along, harness jingling, directly in front of us.
I paid attention only to my own thoughts: Something needed to be done about Cutter and Madame Laelia Sibyl de Papaver, Astral Perditorian. I had no proof, but the more I turned matters over in my mind, the more I considered they might be involved in a kidnapping ring together. Inference: She had told him about me. Who else could have done so? The lodge-keeper, the duchess, her maids? Most unlikely. Of all those whom I had encountered at Basilwether Hall, only Inspector Lestrade and Madame Laelia had heard me describe the whereabouts of Lord Tewksbury. One of those two had contacted Cutter to have him wire Squeaky to take Tewky prisoner. Surely it had not been Lestrade. Conclusion: It must have been Madame Laelia.
Tewky said, “I never understood why they put the driver way up top in back, so far from the horse. Now I see. It is so that nothing obstructs one’s view.”
“Mmm-hmm,” I murmured, continuing my dark thoughts of Madame Laelia. While appearing to be on the side of the angels, the woman had actually allied herself with the devils: Cutter and Squeaky. They kidnapped a victim, I conjectured, and then Madame Laelia was called in for her dubious services, so that while Cutter and Squeaky collected ransom, Madame Laelia was paid handsomely for her spiritual insights into the missing person’s whereabouts. They all profited, and they were all in their foul business together. In Tewky’s case, although initially he had run away, Cutter and Squeaky had seized the opportunity to kidnap him afterward.
While unsure how to notify the authorities without putting myself in jeopardy, I kne
w I had to do something to put a stop to this villainy.
Tewky said, “How pleasant it is to feel the wind in one’s face on a hot day.”
Annoying boy, must he chatter like a magpie? Without replying, lips pressed together, I reached into a skirt pocket and pulled out a pencil and a folded piece of paper. Hastily and rather angrily, laying the paper in my lap, I sketched an exaggerated portrait of a man. When Tewky saw what I was doing, he ceased his chitchat to stare.
“That’s Cutter,” he said.
Without comment I finished the likeness.
“That is Cutter, right down to the hair in his ears. You astonish me. How do you draw like that?”
Without answering, I turned over the folded paper, and on the fresh surface I sketched another person. Because I found myself in the proper frame of mind, wrought and energetic, I was able to do so without hesitation, without conscious memory, without thought, the pencil strokes coming swiftly to hand from some source deep within my mind.
“Who’s that?” Tewky asked.
Again, I did not answer. Finishing the portrait of a large, imposing woman, I unfolded the paper and looked at both sketches at once. The caricature man and the caricature woman stood side by side.
At that moment I knew.
Of course. To be a woman, all that was necessary was to put on false hair, various Patent Amplifiers, Enhancers, Improvers, and Regulators, and the necessary concealments: dress, hat, gloves. I of all people should know.
Tewky saw, too. He whispered, “It’s the same person.”
The bright red wig, I thought, to hide the hairy ears and distract attention from the face. And some enhancement of the lips, eyelashes, and eyes, easy enough—face paint. No respectable lady would ever admit to the use of such artifice, but I had heard it was done. Not that this person was either respectable or a lady.
The Case of the Missing Marquess Page 11