Sweet Songbird

by Sweet Songbird (retail) (epub)

  ‘Come on!’ He leapt ahead of her. She bunched her skirts above her knees and scrambled after him. Panting, she almost fell through the small wooden door that he held open for her at the top of the stairs. He slammed it behind her, locked it, pocketed the key.

  She gaped.

  She was standing in a large chamber, beautifully proportioned, and panelled in wood. At one end was an enormous open fireplace, in which blazed a great log fire. The door through which she had just flung herself was in the corner of the room, set into the panelling, almost impossible to see. A huge, round, beautifully patterned stained glass window lit the room with its jewelled colours. In the wall opposite the fireplace was a huge door, massively barred. But it was the contents of the room that held her for one incredulous moment almost rooted to the spot, and staring. The place was a treasure-house, an Aladdin’s cave; soft, rich rugs glowed upon the floor, luxurious furs thrown over the huge couch that dominated one end of the room, elegant, comfortable furniture glowed in the light of the fixe, as did marble statues, the pictures that adorned the walls, the delicate glass and china.

  The ill-gotten rewards of deceit and theft. Even in that fraught, astonished moment she knew it. ‘What is this place?’

  Luke brushed past her and in a couple of long strides was across the room and kneeling in front of a massive ebony bookcase. ‘Abbot’s room. This church used to be part of a priory. Ah—’ He straightened, and at the bare touch of his hand the huge piece of furniture seemed almost to float away from the wall, revealing another small, panelled door. He grinned a little. ‘An appropriate time to examine the good priest’s cellars, I think. This way.’ He held out a hand to usher her through the door. From far away came a violent crashing sound. ‘They’re breaking into the church,’ he said, and glanced at the great barred door at the end of the room, ’so at least Spider didn’t tell them about the back door. They’ll have a bit of trouble there, I should think.’ He looked back at her still, frightened face. ‘The guided tour,’ he said, gently, his eyes encouraging, ‘starts, I’m afraid, of necessity in the cellars.’ He moved his fingers, beckoning her into the darkness. The violent sounds from below were louder.

  She ran across the room to him. A waft of freezing, evil-smelling air hit her. After only a moment’s hesitation she stepped through the door and found herself upon a small, flagged platform from which steep stone steps led downwards. Luke followed her. On the wall just inside the door was a dusty shelf upon which lay several candles, one in a tarnished brass holder. He took a box of matches from his pocket and, with a perfectly steady hand struck one, lit the candle in the holder and pocketed the others. Then he turned his unhurried attention back to the bookcase. Using a small handle on the back he guided it soundlessly back so that it concealed the doorway, then he knelt and pulled a small lever. The massive piece settled upon the floor like a rock. ‘Take God Himself to shift that.’ He shut and barred the little door.

  ‘You’re very well organized,’ Kitty said.

  She saw the glimmer of his smile. ‘Be a daft rat that didn’t have a bolthole.’

  Darkness had settled about them, momentarily blinding despite the candle. Kitty stood quite still, waiting for her eyes to adjust. Oddly, for all the panic that had preceded this moment she was unafraid. With light, sound too had been cut off. They stood for a moment in a cold circle of stillness. The candle guttered and danced. Luke’s shadow loomed upon the wall, his hawk’s face was limned in gold by the flickering flame he held.

  Soundlessly he turned and led the way down into darkness.

  (ii)

  She had a brief moment to be amazed at her own calmness. As if this madness were part of the most everyday occurrence in the world she followed him, stepping carefully, steadying herself with a hand upon the damp, rough surface of the cold wall. From below she heard the sound of water dripping. Luke lifted the candle above his head. Shadows lurched upon the curved walls.

  ‘Watch the steps. They’re a bit slippery.’ His voice echoed eerily within the confined space.

  ‘Where are we?’

  ‘We’re going down into the crypt. It runs under the building next door and then joins the sewer that runs under the road.’ He sensed her reaction and she heard the smile in his voice. ‘You’re right. Not the sweetest place in the world. But if you can stand it – and if the waters aren’t too high – it’s a damned sight safer than facing our friends up there.’

  She had not missed the qualification. ‘And what if the waters are too high?’

  ‘Then it’s a bit stickier.’ His voice, though still cheerful, had lost the smile. ‘We choose between swimming and sitting and twiddling our thumbs until it’s safe to go back upstairs.’

  There was, she thought, little point in voicing the obvious question as to how they were supposed to know when that magic moment had arrived. ‘Are you sure they can’t follow us?’ she asked. .

  ‘Certain.’ The word was confident. Luke paused, turned, watched her by the light of the candle. ‘Even if they knew of the existence of the door – which I’m sure they don’t – it’d take a steam roller to move that bookcase. Don’t worry. We’re safe down here.’

  ‘Am I allowed to know from whom?’ There was a small touch of bravado in her voice. ‘If I’m going to die young, oughtn’t I to know why?’

  A cold draught wafted up the stairs, bringing with it a foetid whiff of soiled and polluted water. He turned and started on down the stairs. ‘Some years ago I made some rather – unorthodox – arrangements concerning an ex-partner of mine. He’d tried to gammon me once too often. I thought it might suit us both if he spent the rest of his life in rather sunnier climes. He didn’t appreciate my efforts. Damned ungrateful of him.’

  ‘You shopped him?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And he was transported.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And now he’s back? And is looking for you?’

  ‘So it would seem. Funny – I’d never have thought he had it in him. Life, he got, so he isn’t back here courtesy of Her Majesty. Botany Bay must have toughened him.’

  ‘And now he wants to kill you.’

  His laughter was grim. ‘That, I imagine, is the least he wants to do.’

  ‘So he’s not going to give up?’

  ‘I imagine not – not until—’

  ‘Until what?’

  She sensed his shrug. ‘Not until one of us is dead. That’s right.’

  In silence she followed him down into darkness.

  A few minutes later they reached level ground. Luke lifted the candle high. They were standing on wet flagstones beneath a vaulted stone barrel of a roof. The air was thick with the suffocating stench of the sewer, that fouled the throat and curdled the stomach. The light flickered upon several ancient stone tombs that were lined against the wall. As Luke moved forward there was a sudden scrabbling sound, and an offendedly indignant squeal. Rats. Kitty’s skin crawled. For one moment she considered seriously the alternative of facing the men upstairs. At least the terror there was in light, and air. The reeking darkness bore down on her like the weight of all evil.

  ‘Are you all right?’ Luke’s voice held a small, sharp edge.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Come on, then, this way.’ He led her forward, through a series of low arches. Kitty put a hand over her nose and mouth, trying to filter the foul air. The awful, scurrying rat-sounds were all round them. Small, vicious eyes gleamed, sinisterly red in the candlelight. Her legs were shaking, and her skin was cold as the hand of death. ‘God,’ she muttered, behind her hand, ‘I h-hate rats.’

  His cold hand tightened on hers. ‘It’s all right. They can’t hurt you.’

  ‘I kn-know—’ Her teeth were chattering.

  ‘Can you go on?’

  Glad of the darkness that hid the sudden craven rise of tears, ‘Yes,’ she said.

  A few minutes later they had reached the end of the crypt and stood in a long, brick-built, dripping tunnel. By the light of t
he flame that Luke carried Kitty could see that the curved walls were in ill-repair and covered for the most part in a spectacularly evil-looking slime. She could also see that the slow-moving river of filth that they enclosed reached from wall to wall and even encroached upon the stone floor of the crypt. The foul stuff must have been more than waist deep.

  ‘Shit!’ Luke said, beneath his breath, with bitter feeling, betraying in the one word his disappointment at the height of the flow.

  Unexpected hysterical laughter gurgled in Kitty’s throat. Her stomach was heaving. ‘That’s what it is all right,’ she said. ‘At least, most of it.’

  He coughed with laughter. Stood for a long moment surveying the disgusting river of ordure. ‘Kitty – do you think you could—?’

  ‘No!’ She shook her head, gestured at her wide, heavy skirts. ‘How could I?’

  ‘It’s a few hundred yards, that’s all. Then it empties in the canal—’

  ‘You go,’ she said. ‘In these skirts I’d drown. And without them I’d freeze to death. You go. Get help—’ She grimaced over her shoulder. A rat scuttled.

  ‘Plan number two,’ he said.

  ‘What’s that?’

  He jerked his head back at the crypt. ‘We make ourselves comfortable and wait.’

  She lifted skirts already sodden with the sewer-filth that polluted the floor. ‘We make ourselves what? Truly, Luke Peveral, I’m coming to believe that you must have a very peculiar sense of humour!’

  He laughed, gave her his hand. ‘Let’s go and find ourselves a coffin.’

  They moved back into the crypt, away from the nightmare stream. The smell, however, followed them, clinging about them, as tangible, it seemed to Kitty, as the London fog that wreathed the streets above them.

  ‘Here—’ Near the steps down which they had come was a large, flat tomb, ancient, begrimed, littered with rat dirt, the inscription indecipherable in the weak light. ‘Sorry, friend,’ Luke addressed the occupant drily, ‘we won’t be with you for long.’ He took Kitty by the waist. ‘Jump—’ He deposited her on top of the tomb, vaulted up after her. ‘We’ll be dry here at least and out of the way of our four-legged friends.’

  ‘This—’ Kitty muttered, tucking her legs beneath her skirts in a vain attempt to warm them, ‘is getting to be too much of a habit.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Nothing.’ She settled herself as best as she could, her back against the wall. She felt as if a part of her brain had ceased to function altogether. Since the moment she had found Spider, beaten and bleeding upon her brother’s bed, an understandable air of unreality had stalked events.

  Luke set the candle beside her, crossed his long legs and rested his hands loosely on his knees. They looked at each other in silence.

  ‘Now what?’ Kitty asked, her voice fragile in the dripping quiet.

  He considered, soberly, for a moment. ‘Well, since this is hardly the time or place for a seduction—’ Mischievously he left a small, half-questioning pause before settling more easily against the wall, long hands resting upon his bent knees. ‘Why don’t you tell me the story of your life?’

  * * *

  ‘—and so we came to London. Matt fell in with Croucher at Covent Garden and – you know the rest—’

  A rat rustled across the floor. The small remnant of candle burned steadily. Her eyes were used to the light now, and she could discern every expression on his face. Even the vile smell seemed to have diminished a little, though she realized that this too must be because she had become used to it.

  She wondered, dispassionately, why in all her narrative she had made no mention of Amos Isherwood.

  He tilted his head. He had listened to her story intently, with hardly any interruptions. ‘You’ve had some bad luck.’

  She glanced at him sharply. She could not let that pass. For a moment the warmth of comradeship that during the telling of her story had enclosed them as the light from the candle enclosed them, cooled, as the candle might flicker in a cold draught. ‘No. It’s had nothing to do with bad luck. Our misfortunes have stemmed from one thing and one thing only. Matt’s thieving.’

  Amos smiled knowingly in the darkness. She ignored him.

  ‘It wasn’t his fault that old Sir What’s-his-name and his sons drowned.’

  ‘No.’ Her voice was obstinate. ‘But after that.’

  The silence was broken by the irregular dripping of water from the roof. ‘You really do hate it, don’t you?’ he asked at last, quietly.

  ‘Yes I do!’ Her voice was suddenly violent. ‘All of it. It isn’t even just a case of honesty or dishonesty any more. I hate the squalor. I hate the fear. There’s no pride in any of it!’

  ‘There’s not a lot of pride in starving either.’

  ‘There are other ways to eat.’

  He cocked a sardonic brow. ‘You think so? You believe, do you, in the pride of honest labour, the commendable sweat of a respectable man who slaves for others to see his children starve?’

  Shaken by the depth of bitterness in the words she did not reply.

  He shook his head. ‘You’ve got it wrong, Kitty. The people you so easily despise – including me, including your brother – they may be everything you believe they are – they may be vicious, and cruel, and frightened and degenerate. They may be worthless. They may deserve no more than the lash or the hangman’s noose. But think. What kind of society has produced these people? Are they not also, in their way, victims? Victims of a society whose sternest judgement and punishment is visited upon those unfortunate enough to be born poor? What greater crime is there than being penniless? For nothing more than that thousands upon thousands of souls are condemned to the harshest of hard labour, to the most atrocious living conditions that man could envisage, to disease, to hopelessness and to death. They watch their loved ones die – their wives, their husbands, their children. And for their inability to save themselves from the quicksand of poverty into which others have thrown them they are castigated, preached at, despised. Do you wonder that half the population of Stepney is three parts drunk most of the time and on the sharp side of the law all of the time? What else would you have them do? Have you seen the sweatshops? No hard labour in Newgate can touch them, take it from me. Have you seen the girls – girls no older than you – blinded, and stooped like old women? Burned and scarred by phosphorus? Do you blame them, then, for selling their bodies? Have you seen the children making boxes for a ha’penny a gross – and a glass of water and a crust of dry bread stopped out of their wages?’

  She was staring at him in astonishment. He stopped. Spread his hands, studying the nails. Lifted his head again.

  ‘Matt didn’t have to do any of those things,’ she said, quietly.

  ‘No. And neither, if you’re asking, did I.’ The unusual passion had died as quickly as it had flamed. ‘Of course, you’re right. Matt and I – we’re the other kind. Born to hang.’

  ‘Don’t say that!’

  His brows lifted. ‘Sorry.’

  She shrugged.

  ‘Matt can’t help it,’ he said.

  ‘That’s what he said.’

  ‘Believe him. He knows.’

  ‘I don’t understand it.’

  ‘No. I don’t suppose you do.’

  ‘It would have broken Father’s heart.’

  Silence.

  ‘I promised I’d look after him—’ she said, her quiet voice all but lost in the still darkness.

  ‘And so you have.’

  ‘Not well enough.’ She was fidgeting with her sodden woollen skirt, pleating it with her fingers, smoothing it out.

  ‘I’m sure he wouldn’t agree with you.’

  She could not repress a smile. ‘What’s so different about that? Matt agrees with very little I say.’

  They fell to silence. After a moment, a little defiantly, she said, ‘Your turn.’

  ‘What is?’

  ‘The soul-baring. I’ve told you about us. Now it’s your turn.’

&n
bsp; ‘You mean – what’s my excuse?’ The tone was bantering.

  ‘If you like.’

  ‘I can think of more interesting subjects to talk about,’ he said, a little tentatively.

  She maintained an obstinate silence.

  ‘Very well.’ He dug into his pocket and produced a fresh candle, lit it from the guttering remnant in the holder. As he carefully forced the new candle in the melted, dying stub of the old she studied his dark, closed profile. He sat back. The candle stood, tall flame bright and steady between them. His eyes were fixed upon it, thoughtfully. For a moment she thought he was not going to continue. Then, ‘Once upon a time,’ he said, ‘there was a princess, fair and very beautiful.’ His voice was light. She did not know if he mocked her or not. ‘She lived in splendour and comfort in a great house in the country. She dined off silver platters and drank from the finest crystal. Dressed in silks and in satins, she rode in a carriage behind the finest pair of matched bays in the county. She was kind and she was gentle, and she was very much loved.’ He paused. Kitty sat, watching and waiting, still and quiet as a mouse. ‘But yet – there was something missing in her life. She did not know herself what it was, you understand – she only knew – something missing – something important—’ The dark, deeply shadowed eyes lifted to Kitty’s face. ‘And then the gypsy came.’

  It occurred to Kitty that he had told this tale before. She waited.

  ‘He was handsome – oh, yes, the finest-looking man the princess had ever seen was the gypsy. And proud as Lucifer. And wicked as the hounds of hell.’ His eyes had drifted from her and were fixed once again upon the candleflame. ‘But of course the princess didn’t know that. She saw the handsome face, the splendid body, the proud glance and was stricken with’ – for a second his long mouth twitched into an entirely mirthless smile – ‘lust.’

  He fell silent. When the silence lengthened Kitty could not resist saying, as she knew she was expected to, ‘What happened?’

  ‘Don’t be silly, Songbird. What do you think happened? She lay with the gypsy one night under the stars. And for one night of pleasure reaped a short lifetime of misery. When it was discovered that she was carrying his child she was turned from her father’s door. Naturally enough she fled to her lover. And he beat her and humiliated her and treated like a dog the child that she bore him.’