by Andy Conway
“Daniel,” said Tom, rising, hands splayed out in apology. “I’m so sorry.”
“So am I, Tom. Please forgive me. I’m normally much more hospitable. But several things this morning... just means I’m in no mood for strangers in my house.”
Tom nodded and reached for his jacket. “I understand. I can’t apologize enough.”
“I didn’t mean you, Tom. You’re not a stranger to me and you’re welcome to stay.”
Tom turned at the door, tears in his eyes. “I appreciate that, Daniel. But you’ve seen for yourself how hard it’s been for me to escape that woman and everything she represents. That’s why I want nothing to do with her anymore. And I can’t tell you how ashamed it makes me to have brought this into your home. I can’t tell you how sorry I am.”
Tom walked up the hallway and was gone.
Daniel slumped into the sofa where Catherine Eddowes and William Bury had been sitting moments before, letting his old friend leave, feeling shame, but also relief.
13
AFTER THOMAS CONWAY had left Daniel’s house, anger burning inside him like vitriol, he tramped down the street and saw Catherine and the strange man she’d turned up with far ahead.
He wanted to rush after her and kill her for making him feel such shame. He wanted to walk in the opposite direction and never see her again. But he swallowed his rage and a third option came to him.
Follow them, he thought. See what she’s up to.
The fact that she’d turned up like a bad penny hadn’t surprised him at all — she had been doing it for the last few years; always when she wanted money, and always at a time calculated to cause maximum embarrassment to him. But to catch a train all the way to Birmingham: that was different. It showed a determination he didn’t think she possessed: a determination he believed had long ago been drowned in gin.
Catherine must have gone to their daughter, Annie, and found out where he was, then bought a ticket and followed him all this way. She was up to something, he was sure.
Down St. Mary’s Row and its huddle of workshops, almost all gunmakers. Birmingham was famous for it. They were all over the city. The guns that built the Empire were made right here. The gun that the real Thomas Conway had held in Bombay and Madras too, no doubt. But not only here. Little Annie’s husband in Southwark was one too, hadn’t she said? My daughter, married to a gunmaker. Her father, an ex-soldier. Circle of life. Circle of death.
Like that first day, when he’d first arrived in this time.
He’d escaped, flashing through a century, and found himself in his Victorian clothes, materializing in St. Mary’s graveyard, staring into the terrified eyes of a man who gasped and croaked and clutched his arm and crumpled, falling against a headstone, buckling as if all the life in him had been sucked out of him.
He was alone in a Victorian graveyard with a dead man.
He’d killed him. The shock of seeing a man appear out of thin air had fractured his poor heart.
He had tried to help the man, but there was nothing for it. He was dead. He went through his pockets, to discover who he was. Perhaps he could alert the police to identify him.
But he knew he wasn’t going to do that, even as he rooted through his meagre possessions. He knew he was never going to go to the police.
He found money, and a pension book in the name of Thomas Quinn. He puzzled over it. How could such a young man be a pensioner? Reading more closely, he discovered the man was an army pensioner, discharged on health grounds, having served in India.
And then the plan had hatched in his mind. He could be Thomas Quinn. He could draw his pension. The pension book was a regular income that would ease his transition to this world. It was almost as if fate had conspired to help him.
He’d taken everything from the poor man’s pockets and walked out of there, hoping no one would recognize him when they found him. He had hailed a jarvey and gone straight to Birmingham, and then the first person he’d spoken to — a charming young girl with a cheeky swagger, who’d given him the glad eye, quite brazenly — he’d told her his real name. Conway.
And there it was. He’d become Tom Conway, the man with a pension book for Thomas Quinn.
Young Catherine. How fine she’d looked that morning.
He’d found her browsing the cart of a bookseller on Jamaica Row, and been beguiled by her instantly. And she by him. He’d bought her a penny dreadful and they’d retired to a pub and he’d thought dreamily of how easy it all was. To travel back in time to a place that could have been so fraught with danger, and within an hour he had an income and a lovely girl on his arm.
He was charmed.
And the charm had lasted a long time. Happy days. Happy years. Lost in time.
When he’d met Daniel Pearce, he’d recognized a fellow spirit immediately. Here was a man lost in time. But he didn’t know it. He thought it was his past that was blank, when all the time it was his future. It was going to hit him hard when he found out who and what he was. And Tom would be the instrument of that torture.
He followed Catherine at a distance as she walked through Moseley village, her boots clomping on the wooden pavement, the younger man in the silly deerstalker hat beside her. Like that man on the train. Was it a new fashion? Could it be the same man?
They passed the Bull’s Head and then the Fighting Cocks and up the gentle slope to the Prince of Wales. They were leaving Moseley. Where were they going?
He followed, determined to find out what she was up to. Anger burning inside his guts.
Poor Daniel. It was all set in motion now. His destiny was coming for him. It was knocking at the door and he would have no choice but to answer. And if he didn’t, it would kick the door down anyway.
14
NOT MORE THAN HALF an hour later there was a knock at the door. Something about the sharp, business-like rat-a-tat-tat made him think it couldn’t be Tom returning.
Daniel opened the door to find two men. One short, in a grey suit and overcoat. The other large, very large, all in brown. Both wearing derbies. He knew, before they spoke, that they were policemen.
“Mr Pearce?” said the short one. He had the eyes of a fox, greying sideburns making his squat face more angular than it was.
“Yes?” said Daniel.
“Inspector Beadle, Kings Norton Constabulary. And this is my colleague, Sergeant MacPherson. Might we come in?”
“I’m sorry,” said Daniel.
“Oh really? What for?”
“I’m sorry but what is this concerning?”
“It’s about a Miss Louisa Gill, sir.”
“And Lily Moore.”
Daniel could not compute the logic of this fresh missile from Hell. What more humiliation could one day bring? All he could do was nod and walk to the parlour and offer them a seat.
They stood before the sofa where Catherine Eddowes and William Bury had sat, but neither of them took a seat, all three standing in the middle of the cramped room like awkward strangers at a terrible party.
“You are a teacher at the Birmingham Municipal School of Art, are you not, sir?”
“Yes, of course,” Daniel replied.
“And might I ask your relationship with Miss Gill?”
The Head had called them to school and sent them after him. Or perhaps Louisa’s father had issued a complaint. Or Sidney. He’d told the Head, and now the Head had informed the police. Or perhaps Sidney had gone directly to them, or to Mr Gill.
“I have no relationship with her, inspector.”
“Oh but you do, Mr Pearce,” said Beadle. “Does a teacher not have a relationship with his students? Is that not a relationship?”
“Well, yes, of course, but that is the extent of it.”
“We do have a report of something a little more than that, sir.”
Macpherson now spoke for the first time, with a distinct Scottish burr. “Is it usual for art teachers to kiss their students in the street?”
This was madness. Daniel felt anger
rising in him again. “I did not kiss her! She thanked me and she kissed my cheek. It rather took me by surprise, and if I must say, I was shocked by it and felt distinctly uncomfortable.”
“Really, sir?” said Beadle. “So you felt affronted by it?”
“Well, in a way, I suppose I did. I certainly did not approve of it or regard it as proper behaviour.”
“Did it anger you?” asked Macpherson.
“Look. What on earth is this about, inspector? A student behaved inappropriately towards me. She transgressed a physical line between student and teacher. It’s a small matter, perhaps worthy of a reprimand, but I hardly see how it concerns the police.”
Beadle let his polite smile drop, adopting an air of concern. “I wouldn’t regard murder as a small matter, Mr Pearce.”
The ground shifted beneath him.
“I’m sorry? What are you talking about?”
“Miss Gill is dead, sir.”
Someone stabbed him in the heart with an icicle.
“Dead?”
“Murdered. Last night.”
“Brutally murdered,” Macpherson added.
“Quite, quite brutally murdered. Just like Miss Moore.”
Daniel was sitting. He had been standing a moment ago, but now he was sitting in the armchair. He thought wildly that it was rude of him to sit before his guests, but he hadn’t been conscious of taking a seat. He must have fallen into it.
“Murdered?” he said.
“Yes, sir. So you see how it might be a matter for the police.”
“Good God.”
“Did you know Miss Moore very well?” the sergeant asked.
“I don’t know who that is,” he said.
The inspector pointed to the newspaper on the sofa. “Oh but you’ve surely read all about it?”
He remembered the name now. The terrible murder in Highgate. Lily Moore. “The news story, yes.”
“How well did you know her, Mr Pearce?”
“Not at all,” said Daniel.
“But she worked for you, didn’t she? She was a life model at the Birmingham Municipal School of Art.”
Daniel looked from Beadle to Macpherson and back again and finally said, “I have no idea.”
“Two terrible murders,” said Macpherson. “And both women from your classroom.”
“I’ve never heard of or encountered this Lily Moore before. If she was a model at the college she certainly hasn’t been a model in my class.”
Daniel regretted his outburst instantly. It was quite possible that she might have been a model for his class. He didn’t always know the names of the models. And if they discovered that she had posed for his students, he would look like a liar.
“Might I ask where you were last night, sir?”
A flash of crimson across pale flesh.
“Yes, yes, yes, of course,” he stammered. “I was with two good friends. We were celebrating. I’m to be married tomorrow.”
“Congratulations. Might I have their names?”
“Arthur Doyle. Doctor Arthur Doyle, my best man. And Mister Thomas Conway.”
“Might I ask what you did with these two friends?”
“I met them in Birmingham. We ate at Trevalyan’s Temperance Hotel, then we came to Moseley and spent the night drinking in the Prince of Wales public house.”
“The Prince of Wales?” said Macpherson. They both seemed surprised and very interested at this.
“Yes. We drank there till closing time.”
“And you’re aware that Miss Gill works at this public house?” asked Beadle.
“Of course. I did see her at one point, but she was serving in the other bar.”
“Did you talk to her at all?”
“No. As I say, I only saw her once.”
“And at closing time, what then?”
“We all three came here and went to bed.”
“And the two gentlemen can account for your presence here all night?”
“Of course. We all slept here.”
“In the same bed?” said Macpherson, with a chuckle.
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
“Forgive my sergeant his bluntness, sir. We are merely trying to ascertain that these two gentlemen — Doctor Doyle and Mr Conway — can account for your movements. Were they sleeping in the same room as you?”
“Well, no. Mr Conway had my bed, Doctor Doyle had that sofa, and I slept in the summer house.”
“The summer house?”
“In the garden. It’s where I paint.”
“May we see the summer house, sir?”
The paintings. The paintings that had made Arabella recoil in horror.
“I’d rather you didn’t.”
The Inspector turned to his sergeant and they shared a look of surprise.
“Might I ask why not?”
“It’s my studio space. It’s where I paint. I don’t like people being in there.”
Inspector Beadle held his gaze for a while, as if burrowing a way into his soul. Daniel felt a strong desire to reach for his red silk handkerchief and mop his brow, but he resisted, his fingers fidgeting.
“We are keen, I’m sure you can understand, to ascertain if your guests, asleep in the house, might be able to hear if you were to, say, sneak out during the night.”
“Sneak out?”
“Would that be possible, without disturbing their sleep?”
“I am not in the habit of sneaking out in the night, inspector.”
“I’m not here to ascertain the likelihood, sir, merely the possibility.”
“May we have a look for ourselves, sir?” asked Macpherson.
“No, you may not.”
“It’s most unusual to be refused in this manner,” said Beadle.
“Wouldn’t you need to procure a search warrant of some kind? If you wanted to search my house?”
Beadle looked at Macpherson. A smile between them, as if they had in fact secured the final piece of evidence that proved his guilt.
“Certainly sir,” said Beadle. “If you wanted to refuse us permission.”
“Then I suggest you do that,” said Daniel.
He could hear himself say it. He knew it sounded bad. It sounded like he was a murderer. If he were standing where they were standing and viewing this, outside himself, he would believe that Daniel Pearce was as guilty as hell.
“Then we shall return,” said Beadle.
They both tipped their hats and trudged out through the hallway.
Daniel closed the door behind them and bolted it. He fought for breath, panic rising in his chest, as he rushed to the summer house. The paintings laid out.
The evidence was as clear as day. A child could see it.
They were portraits of murdered women, painted by their killer.
15
DR. ARTHUR DOYLE PACED up and down before the open gate of Christ Church, oblivious to the human traffic of Council House Square swarming all around him.
He cupped his chin in a thoughtful pose and glanced across at his friend Daniel, sitting on the steps leading up to the church, his head in his hands.
This was a jolly rum do and no mistake. Tragic to see. He had come here expecting to take part in matrimony and merriment, and in the space of a single morning it had turned to murder and mystery.
Daniel had appeared at the due time, on the stroke of noon, but instead of the smiling carefree bachelor about to be a husband he’d expected to see, a ghost had approached him — a living wraith: a man whose life had been taken from him and who now walked on, a shell.
He had divined the story from him, little by little, and was now piecing it all together: the artist’s model who might have posed in his class; the student girl who had crossed a line with him; two brutal murders; the suspicions of the police; the incriminating paintings, and completely unconnected, although equally tragic, the shock of his bride to be at seeing his art. And even the disturbing intrusion of Tom Conway’s estranged wife with a hawker she had apparently pi
cked up on the street, wearing a ridiculous deerstalker hat, no less, which no gentleman would wear in the city. None of that had anything at all to do with the mystery, though. Of that, he was certain.
And he felt, not without a pang of guilt, the thrum of excitement in his chest at that word: mystery. For this was undeniably the sort of mystery that his detective hero might solve. And here Arthur found himself, standing at the epicentre of exactly the sort of mystery he had written about, knowing that Fate had presented him with the opportunity to solve a mystery in real life.
But it wasn’t an adventure story to his friend, he reminded himself. It was a bolt of lightning from a vengeful god that had taken the life from him. As he looked at Daniel he fancied he could almost see through him, as if he had already begun to fade. It really was quite remarkable the physiological devastation the emotions could wreak on the human body.
Surely, the solving of the mystery might save his friend from this living death, he thought. He trusted absolutely that Daniel was not a murderer, which meant that there must be another explanation behind all of this. It merely took a brilliant mind to pick apart the logic and solve the mystery.
It was just the sort of abductive reasoning that his detective hero possessed. Easy enough to simulate in the comfort of a doctor’s surgery, where no patients ever came. Much harder to summon in the instantaneous now of real life.
But he knew he must take the bull by the horns. He strode over to Daniel and mounted the first few steps so that his face was level with his friend’s.
“We must go and investigate,” he said.
Daniel lifted his head and gazed as if waking from a deep sleep, trying to relocate to the waking world. “Investigate?”
“Yes, by Jove. We’re going to investigate. We’re going to solve this mystery.”
“Arthur, it’s not a story,” Daniel winced. “It’s my life.”
This was the reaction he had feared. But he had an answer. “Yes, by George, and if we don’t do something about it, it will be your life at the end of a rope.”
Daniel’s eyes widened with sudden fear and then he smiled bitterly.