An Act of Mercy

by J. J. Durham

  ‘Isn’t that where you speak to spirits?’ asked Dolly. ‘My ma and Lotte have been to some of those meetings … seances, I think you call them.’

  Pilgrim raised an eyebrow. It didn’t sound like the kind of thing Charlotte Piper would do. But, there again, what would he know? Perhaps she’d been trying to get in touch with her late husband.

  Dickens shook his head. ‘Mesmerism is quite different from spiritualism, Constable, although the two are most definitely linked. It is a means of putting someone in a state of deep relaxation, for healing purposes, or for soothing mental agitation. I have had some modest success with it in the past.’ He eyed the two detectives speculatively. ‘And I have found memory recall to be much improved in a mesmeric trance.’

  There was a beat of silence.

  ‘I can’t see her father agreeing to it,’ said Pilgrim.

  ‘Her name is Cohen?’ asked Dickens. ‘Her father is Reuben Cohen the tailor? Is she a pinch-faced little thing with a heavy brow?’

  Pilgrim nodded, although he doubted she would recognize herself from the description.

  ‘I was introduced to Amalia and her father a few weeks ago, at a Chamber of Commerce dinner. That might be useful, don’t you think?’

  ‘I don’t see how,’ said Pilgrim. ‘I can’t imagine she would let you put her in a trance.’

  ‘What if,’ mused Dickens, ‘she was unaware of it?’

  Dolly’s round gaze flashed from Dickens to Pilgrim.

  ‘No,’ snapped Pilgrim. ‘Absolutely not.’

  The bell jangled as Dickens pushed it open. The shop was almost as chilly as the street outside, and the air smelled of dust and tailor’s chalk. Amalia Cohen emerged through the curtain, bundled in a muffler, the tip of her nose rosy with the cold. Dickens stifled a sigh. She presented an unpromising mesmeric subject, her body hunched and defensive.

  ‘Good day to you,’ he said. He gave a start. ‘Good heavens. It’s Miss Cohen, isn’t it?’

  The girl nodded, suspicious.

  He removed his hat and unwound his scarf. ‘We were introduced at the Mayor’s reception. You do remember me?’

  ‘Mr Dickens!’ Her heavy brows rose in astonishment. ‘Of course I remember you.’ Taken unawares by her famous visitor, the girl’s features lost much of their sharpness. She flushed.

  ‘How are you, my dear?’ he asked. ‘Well, I hope?’

  ‘Quite well, thank you. But … my father is out at present.’

  That came as no surprise to Dickens: he had seen Reuben Cohen leave the shop a few minutes before. ‘I haven’t come to call on your father, although it is a pity to have missed him.’ He favoured her with his most disingenuous smile. ‘I am, in fact, looking for ribbon. I trust you can help me?’

  ‘Of course.’ Her surprise gave way to a businesslike demeanour. ‘What kind would you prefer? We have satin, taffeta, grosgrain, and American cotton.’

  ‘Blue?’ He shrugged. ‘Forgive my ignorance. It is a gift for my wife. She has blue eyes. I thought to give her some ribbon to match that she might use to trim whatever takes her fancy. A bonnet, perhaps.’

  Amalia crossed to the shelves and lifted down several reels of ribbon. She put them on the counter, unravelling a length of each for Dickens to inspect. He pointed to one.

  ‘What do you think of this?’ he asked her.

  ‘The satin? It is pretty.’ She ran her fingertip down it. ‘Very soft.’

  ‘It is pretty,’ he agreed slowly, caressing her with his voice. ‘And beautifully soft.’ He ran his finger down the length of it. Once. Twice. ‘Very soft. What shade would you call this?’

  ‘Bluebell.’

  ‘Yes. Bluebell.’ He leaned towards her a little and ran his fingertip down the ribbon again. ‘Bluebell.’

  ‘But I’m not sure it’s right for a bonnet.’

  He hid a flash of annoyance as she picked up one of the other reels.

  ‘This might be better,’ she said. ‘It’s more hardwearing.’ She rubbed her forehead.

  ‘Better. More hardwearing.’ Dickens rubbed his forehead.

  ‘And almost as soft.’ She touched the ribbon.

  ‘Almost as soft.’ He touched the ribbon. ‘What colour would you say this is?’

  ‘Azure.’

  ‘Azure. Exactly so. You have an eye for colour, Amalia.’ He used her first name deliberately. She didn’t react to the overfamiliarity, but continued to stare down at the ribbon. He tapped it thoughtfully with his forefinger. Once. Twice. She reached out her finger. Tapped the ribbon. Once. Twice.

  ‘Azure,’ he repeated. ‘That is the colour of my wife’s eyes exactly.’

  ‘Exactly, yes.’

  He smiled. It was going better than he could have hoped. For all the girl’s prickly exterior she was remarkably magnetic.

  ‘Azure is a beautiful colour. The colour of my wife’s eyes exactly. What colour are your eyes, my dear?’

  She lifted her chin to look at him.

  ‘Brown,’ he said. ‘As brown as autumn leaves. Like your friend Mena’s.’ He held his breath.

  ‘Yes. Like Mena’s.’

  ‘And Mena’s admirer? The man who wrote her letters. His eyes are …’

  ‘Brown.’

  ‘Brown. And his hair is …’

  ‘Brown.’

  ‘How old is he?’ He had been trying to avoid asking a direct question. In this case it couldn’t be helped, but he kept his tone as soothing as possible.

  ‘She thought he was foolish,’ said Amalia. ‘She laughed at him.’

  He smothered a snort of impatience. He had no idea how long he would be able to sustain the trance.

  ‘This man with the brown hair,’ he continued smoothly, ‘with hair as brown as autumn leaves. He wrote Mena letters?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You read them?’

  ‘She read them to me. She knew I was jealous.’

  ‘The letters were signed?’

  ‘No. We called him the Scribbler.’

  ‘And he wrote to her, didn’t he, he told her …’

  ‘How beautiful she was … her hair … her eyes. She was beautiful … it was always Mena men noticed. Never me.’ She paused. ‘I was glad when she went away. I’m glad she’s dead.’

  Her words were matter-of-fact, her expression blank. A chill swept through him, scattering his thoughts.

  The shop bell jangled. Amalia Cohen’s gaze focused again, and fixed on her father who had entered. She frowned at Dickens, as if trying to remember what he was doing there.

  ‘I’ll take a yard of this one, Miss Cohen.’ Dickens picked up the satin ribbon and gave it to Amalia. ‘If you would be so good to wrap it for me?’

  ‘Mr Dickens!’ said Reuben Cohen. ‘What a surprise to see you here. A pleasure, of course, but a surprise.’ He pumped his hand.

  ‘I was just passing, on my way to see Isaac. I needed ribbon.’

  ‘Ribbon?’

  ‘Indeed. And I’m pleased to say your daughter has been most helpful.’ He continued to make small talk with the tailor while Amalia measured the ribbon, cut it, and wrapped it. ‘Thank you.’ He took the package. ‘Will you see me to the door, my dear?’

  Amalia led him out.

  ‘Goodbye, my dear.’ He tapped her on the forearm with his finger. Once. Twice.

  She frowned and opened the door for him. ‘He wanted to see her dance,’ she said.

  ‘Dance?’ He was acutely aware of her father, watching them.

  ‘Yes. He wanted Mena to dance for him.’

  ‘Thank you.’ His voice was deliberately loud. Amalia Cohen’s eyes snapped back into focus. ‘You’ve been most helpful.’

  ‘An absurd waste of time.’ Dickens delivered his verdict as he slid into the coffee shop booth, where Pilgrim and Dolly were waiting for him.

  ‘You couldn’t put her into a trance?’ asked Pilgrim.

  ‘On the contrary. The transference of ethereal fluid was remarkably easy. She was one of the most magnetic su
bjects I’ve ever encountered.’ He snorted. ‘But she was also one of the least observant persons on this earth. All she could tell me was that Mena Levy’s admirer had brown hair and brown eyes.’

  ‘That’s it?’ asked Pilgrim.

  ‘And that he wanted to see her dance.’

  ‘Dance?’

  ‘Indeed. No use whatsoever.’ Dickens turned to Pilgrim with an expression of disgust. ‘Do you have use for a blue ribbon, Sergeant? I can’t see my Kate wanting it.’ He pressed the packet into Pilgrim’s hand.

  ‘She could tell you nothing more?’ Dolly was in a froth of disbelief. ‘Not how old he was? Or how tall? Or where he lived?’

  ‘Nothing.’ It crossed Dickens’s mind to mention Amalia’s animosity towards her so-called friend, but he dismissed the thought. The girl was entitled to some privacy, after all. ‘I would have pressed her further about him, but her father interrupted us.’

  ‘Dolly,’ Pilgrim grasped the constable’s sleeve, ‘I want you to go back to Reuben Cohen’s shop, right this minute.’

  ‘Me, sir? Whatever for?’

  ‘To ask him where he buys his wrapping canvas.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  ‘It’s exactly the same.’ Charley Field turned the packet of ribbon over in his hand, comparing it to the wrapping that had contained Clara Donald’s finger. There were another three samples of the canvas on Pilgrim’s desk – one from Mena Levy’s body, one from Eliza Grimwood’s necklace, and the last from Mena Levy’s ear – all with the same distinctive coarse weave.

  ‘Where did Cohen say the shop was, Adolphus?’

  Dolly hurried to the map on the wall and tapped it. ‘Right here, sir. On Aldgate High Street: Hatchell and Manson, the stationers, sir, selling paper supplies, canvas, and pens.’

  ‘What do we do now, Harry?’ asked Field.

  ‘There’s no point watching the shop. We have no idea who we’re looking for.’

  ‘A brown-haired man with brown eyes,’ said Dolly.

  ‘That’s almost everyone in this room,’ said Field. All five of the detectives were present and only Dolly, whose hair was blonde, didn’t fit the description.

  ‘However,’ began Pilgrim, ‘if someone wished to describe me, they would say I was … disfigured. And if someone wished to describe you, Chief Inspector, they would say you were … ’, Field shot him a warning glare, ‘anything but nondescript.’ Pilgrim finished with a half-smile. ‘Only Tanner and Wainwright actually fit the description of Mena Levy’s admirer.’

  ‘My eyes are blue,’ said Tanner. A muscle jumped in his jaw.

  ‘Witnesses have been known to be unreliable, particularly when it comes to eye colour. The man we’re looking for is distinguished only by his lack of distinguishing marks.’

  ‘I take your point,’ said Field, ‘but it still doesn’t give us a lot to work with.’

  ‘The real problem is not so much that we don’t have a clear description, but that we have no way of knowing for certain that Mena Levy’s admirer is her killer,’ said Pilgrim. He frowned. ‘Mr Dickens should have asked Amalia Cohen if she had seen him since Mena’s disappearance.’

  ‘Mr Dickens?’ Field was immediately alert. ‘Mr Dickens has been questioning witnesses?’

  ‘Only in passing,’ soothed Pilgrim. ‘He’s friends with her father.’

  Dolly had been listening carefully to the exchange. ‘A thought occurs, sir,’ he said to Field. ‘The killer has obviously been watching us. Leaving packages and the like. What if he knows we’ve been talking to Miss Cohen? If he is the anonymous admirer, he knows she can identify him. The last person who could identify him got his throat cut.’

  ‘By God, you’re right, Adolphus. Could the girl be in danger, Harry?’

  Pilgrim frowned. ‘I hadn’t thought of that, but I have to admit it’s a possibility.’

  ‘This could be the perfect opportunity to catch the bugger!’ crowed Field. ‘We’ll take it in turns to watch the house. He thinks he’s so clever, but this time we might outwit him.’

  ‘Should we warn her father?’ asked Pilgrim.

  ‘And have the whole of London Jewry in a froth on the strength of mere conjecture? No.’

  Pilgrim pressed his lips together, but he said nothing. He went to study the map. ‘She and her father live above the shop. There’s a lane runs round the back of Artillery Lane from Bishopsgate Street. We’ll have to watch in pairs: one at the front and one at the back.’

  ‘I’ll work out a roster,’ said Dolly.

  ‘Splendid idea.’ Field nodded. ‘But don’t include Wainwright in your plans this afternoon. He’s going to St Bartholomew’s. Hector Fairweather wants a sketch of Angus Trinkle’s body before the autopsy.’

  ‘Before the autopsy?’ said Pilgrim.

  ‘The contortions.’ Field rubbed his nose. ‘A record for medical posterity.’

  All the men fell silent, remembering the scene in the cells.

  Tanner was studying the map. ‘Did you say this girl lives in Artillery Lane? We’ll stand out like pricks in a nunnery.’

  ‘The Sergeant’s right, sir,’ said Dolly.

  ‘Then we’ll have to employ our imaginations. And the extensive contents of the Whitehall lost property department.’

  ‘Aren’t we supposed to ask permission before we use disguises?’ asked Pilgrim.

  Field scowled. ‘Let me worry about that.’ He dismissed them.

  Pilgrim caught Dolly’s eye as they left the room. ‘Do you still have the pawn ticket you found in Clara Donald’s things?’

  ‘It’s in my pocket.’

  ‘Let’s see to that, before you start drawing up rosters.’

  Ma Jellybelly’s shop in Chick Lane was an Aladdin’s cave of unredeemed goods – china cups, vases, flutes, fiddles, prayer books, ivory ornaments, silver watches, spoons, rings, brooches, chess sets, blankets, clothes, and carpenters’ tools – all stacked on shelves or displayed in dirty glass cabinets. The shop window and main door fronted the lane itself, but the entrance that was used the most lay in the side alley. It led directly to a row of wooden booths, facing a counter, an arrangement that ensured the anonymity of anyone not wishing to be seen hocking the family silver.

  Pilgrim and Dolly slid into one of the cubicles and waited to be noticed. On the counter, in a column in front of them, three tickets were held in a frame beside three little inkpots. A special pen holder with three nibs allowed three tickets to be written simultaneously with one dip in the ink: one for the record, one to be pinned to the goods, and the other for the customer. The tickets were not the same as the one Dolly had found in Clara Donald’s box, which had probably only escaped the notice of the Widow Kelly because it had been tucked between the pages of a bible. They could hear voices from the neighbouring cubicle.

  ‘I’ll give you two shillings for it.’ A woman’s voice, harsh and rasping.

  ‘That’s solid silver, that is.’ Another woman, with a pleading tone.

  ‘It’s plate. Two shillings. Take it or leave it.’

  The second woman evidently took it, for there was silence, followed by the clink of coins, and the scrape of a stool.

  Mrs Edinburgh, the shop owner, plonked herself on the stool opposite Pilgrim and Dolly. She was known by locals as Ma Jellybelly, for reasons not immediately apparent, for she was a wizened little woman with a tongue like the sting of a wasp.

  ‘Evening, Ma,’ said Pilgrim.

  She blinked and her features smoothed. ‘I ain’t got nothing for you, Sergeant. Not today. Things is quiet at the moment. The lads ’ave been takin’ a breather.’

  ‘I’m not after information, at least not the usual kind. Can you tell me whose ticket this is?’ He passed Clara Donald’s pawn ticket to her over the counter. ‘There’s no shop name on it.’

  She dismissed it with a sniff. ‘It’s plain enough. See them two marks? Them’s wings. This ticket’s from the Angel Leaving Shop, in Islington. Angel, ha! Devil more like. You want to be careful, do
in’ business with Bert Tanner. He’ll have the shirt off your back soon as look at you.’

  Dolly flashed a round-eyed look at Pilgrim.

  ‘Tanner?’ repeated Pilgrim.

  ‘The son. The old man died last year.’

  ‘Did he have more than one son?’

  ‘Not that I knows of. All I knows is that Bert Tanner took over the shop, and he’s been stealin’ the meat out of my mouth ever since.’

  Pilgrim took the ticket from her.

  ‘I’ll be back next week,’ he said, getting to his feet.

  ‘I don’t know that I’ll ’ave anything for you next week. Like I says, things is quiet presently.’

  ‘Let’s hope they don’t get too quiet, Ma,’ said Pilgrim mildly, ‘or I might take the time to look around your shop.’

  The woman glared at him.

  ‘Next week,’ he said again, then left her with a nod.

  Dolly followed him out of the shop.

  ‘Is it Sergeant Tanner’s brother, do you think? He said his father used to have a pawnshop.’

  ‘What if it is?’ Pilgrim shrugged. ‘It’s a small world.’

  ‘It’s something of a coincidence, though sir, isn’t it? And Islington’s a long way from Worship Street.’

  ‘What are you suggesting?’

  Dolly’s eager expression turned crestfallen. ‘I’m not sure, exactly.’

  ‘No.’ Pilgrim eyed him. ‘Neither am I.’

  Dolly changed the subject. ‘I take it you have an arrangement with Mrs Edinburgh, sir?’

  ‘You could say that.’ In fact it was a highly satisfactory agreement, on his part at least.

  Ma Jellybelly was the brains behind the Dancing School, an elite gang of burglars whose entrance to properties was usually effected over a roof top, or through an apparently inaccessible window. They were supple and crafty, targeting only the most affluent neighbourhoods, which meant that Pilgrim’s conscience was not troubled in the slightest by turning a blind eye to their activities. In exchange for his short-sightedness, Ma Jellybelly kept him informed of any criminal activity of the non-thieving kind that took place on her patch.

  It had already borne fruit on several occasions, and had led to convictions in all but one. That case still vexed Pilgrim whenever he thought of it. One of Ma Jellybelly’s younger boys, crouched on a rooftop in Mayfair, had watched through a window as a banker throttled his pregnant mistress with one of her own stockings. The boy had had the presence of mind to hotfoot it straight to Ma’s in Chick Lane, and Pilgrim had been able to lead other police officers to the girl’s body before the banker had the opportunity to hide it.