An Unkindness of Ravens

by S. E. Smith

  At a cough, metallic and cold in sound, I turned back from the street to find myself staring at tall man with soulless grey-green eyes.

  “Good Lord!” he said with a joviality that didn’t match the impassive nature of his face: “You! ... Well, well, well! You haven’t changed a bit.”

  Put on the wrong foot, my answer was brutal, “I’m sorry, I don’t know who you are.”

  Yet, to my surprise, instead of being enraged by my forgetfulness, a tsunami of a chuckle engulfed him.

  “You wound me, Sergeant Lamb!” he chortled. “But then I suppose you meet so many people in your line of work and I should be grateful not to stand out ...” The tsunami died abruptly and taking out a handkerchief, which he proceeded to fold like a piece of origami, he studied me carefully. I found his actions creepy and was, unfortunately, unable to keep my shudder of revulsion at bay. On seeing it, his chortle returned and the door widened. “So, Sergeant Lamb, tell me what makes you renew our acquaintance eleven years on?” he asked as I stepped over the threshold.

  “I’m here to ask Doctor Gull some questions. Someone mentioned him in connection with the murder of a girl called Mary Kelly.”

  “I. See.” The chuckle ceased abruptly. His eyes darkened, became little more than gimlets, and I was immediately reminded of the vampire in the book I was reading. I shivered again but ploughed on regardless.

  “Clearing up loose ends. Finishing up paperwork.” I told him. “After all, as my boss keeps telling me, there’s no way the doctor could have done it.”

  The man observed me closely, holding the silence until closing the door behind us, he said. “No, you’re right he couldn’t. Doesn’t have the skills or the inclination to rip a girl to pieces.” He took my coat, “Now me? That would be a different story. After all, remember what I did to Billy Pearce ...”

  Memories long buried crashed their way to prominence. I looked up into the face of evil personified.

  “Exactly,” Baker purred. “Now run along. Clear my employer and forget we ever crossed paths. If you don’t ...”

  From the Casebook of Symington, Earl Byrd. Scotland Yard.

  “But why now?” Lamb asked as he concluded his tale. “I didn’t do what he demanded when I got back to the station and he didn’t do anything.”

  “Perhaps he knew you weren’t going to be believed,” I reasoned. “Who’d you tell?”

  Lamb rubbed at his upper arm as he considered the question. “My boss and your predecessor, Sir Charles, but they just laughed in my face. Said I was imagining things. Told me I was clutching at straws to gain notoriety. Insisted that if Doctor Gull didn’t do it, stood to rights the assistant couldn’t do it either.”

  “And yet the assistant regards you as a threat now, I wonder why?” CC blew his nose. “Who else did you tell?”

  “And more importantly, Lamb, why did he believe you?” I added.

  “I didn’t ...” Lamb’s denial trailed into silence as he realised I already knew the answer to CC’s question. The old sergeant’s shoulders slumped. His hands went to his head and held it, as though offering it comfort.

  “The clock’s ticking, Sergeant.”

  It ticked some more ... then a faraway voice broke its monotony.

  “I got very drunk one night in the Ten Bells; got talking to... I knew afterwards I shouldn’t have said what I did. Not because of the threat ... but he knew the Bravo staff and Gull; and was friendly with Flo Long ... so, it seemed only fair to warn him. Although from the way Gold reacted, I got the feeling he already knew who Baker was.”

  Well that put the cat amongst the pigeons, no mistake.

  From the Testimony of Peter Watkins, Driver to Earl Byrd.

  The guv was in one of his pensive moods when I picked him up from Scotland Yard. The one you never interrupted unless you wanted your head bit off. I took the directions from him, listening intently, for I’d never been to the house in Cripplegate before, I’d always delegated that pleasure to Imran. Then I left the guv to his silence and his moping.

  Old Sober-sides opened the door as we pulled up in front of a property that was above the usual quality for the area. Genteel and well-maintained, it didn’t feel or look like any of the places he usually bought for his mistresses. But then Miss Emily wasn’t the guv’s mistress.

  As he went inside, I went back to Mayfair to pick up Imran. It seemed the guv didn’t want to be without backup tonight.

  From the Casebook of Symington, Earl Byrd.

  In my absence, Emily worked wonders. Lashings of cake awaited us, as well as tea, coffee and hot water - bubbling in a samovar, the like of which I’d never seen before. A beautiful piece, out of place and too costly for the likes of me and my girl.

  It was a present from the man ensconced in my favourite chair.

  “From Tula,” Gold said, seeing the direction of my gaze. “A family heirloom. Only used on special occasions. Too ostentatious for a simple businessman. It will make a superb engagement gift.” His shoulders shook with ever-present mirth, and, in an attempt to ignore the scorpion who delighted in informing me we were rumbled, I plastered a suitably benign look to my face.

  “Uncle, you pre-empt things. I’ve not even approached the King about ending my marriage to Manali.”

  Gold smiled tolerantly. “It will be granted you mark my words.” He looked around the room and beckoned Emily over. “Sit down, bubbeleh, sit down. You have worked wonders with this little place. Quite the home. Quite the home, don’t you think, Nanny?”

  “If you say so, Mordy.” Nanny seemed even more prickly than I recalled from our last encounter. Less at ease with the world, even less at ease with me, I was subjected to a hard stare and a narrowing of brows, before, with a sniff, she picked up her needles and set off to win the blue ribbon for speed knitting.

  Feeling a fraud, I turned my attention away from Gold’s gentle mockery and wondered how my staff fared, for, in addition to Nanny, Gold brought Niall and Jethro with him as his minders for the night.

  It was a move designed to put me at ease, to show his approval of this little life. But because I knew the sham was about to end, I couldn’t relax. Neither it seemed could Emily - if the twitching of her fingers was anything to go by.

  “My cousin is here to guarantee my safety, and that of your niece,” I said as CC’s dulcet tones wafted down the hallway.

  Nanny’s needles slowed.

  “He is, son? How delightful! ... May I ask why?” Gold clapped his hands – ostensibly in delight – and Niall and Jethro ... hotly pursued by Sampson, Watkins and Imran ... emerged from the kitchen.

  “Because you have been pulling the wool, Uncle,” I told him as the old man’s eyes frosted over. “And it’s time to end your charade.”

  “What makes you think I have been pulling the wool, son?”

  His reasonable tone brought tension to my spine and made my blood run cold. I walked a proverbial tightrope. One wrong step - a metaphorical fall - and the affable father figure would vanish completely.

  I took a deep breath. “You said yourself, Uncle, you’re no longer a young man. Your health’s not as good as it was, and you want your successor in place before this century’s much older. What better way to ensure Emily complies with your wishes than by implying you’re the victim of some nefarious criminal?”

  CC stared. He’d told me he didn’t want to know anything in advance of the meeting. Said that, as Gold had a way of ferreting stuff out by osmosis, the less he knew of my plans, the better.

  “But I’m being poisoned with antimony.” The eyes twinkled despite themselves. “I’m a victim of this poisoner of yours.”

  I smiled back. “Antimony’s in your system, Uncle; I’ll give you that. But you’re in no danger from that murderer ... unlike the danger you face at the hands of Gordon Langley’s killer.”

  Gold’s amusement paled; he knew precisely what I meant. My feet danced in their shoes, the scorpions massed in the shadows of my mind, telling me to unmask the p
awnbroker’s perfidy directly, but I routed them.

  “Emily when did your uncle start to feel ill?” I asked before Gold could wrest control of the conversation and blindside us with more smoke and mirrors.

  “Shortly after Christmas.”

  CC’s reached for his handkerchief. “After you left Mayfair following the Cufflink business?”

  She tilted her head. He glared at the square of white fabric as if seeing it for the first time.

  “A little cough here; a little cough there. Nothing to worry even the fondest of hearts?”

  “Exactly, Sym.” Emily nodded eagerly. “I thought nothing of it, till he tried to convince the world he wasn’t really ill, and it was all a game to strengthen our position after Millie’s murder last year.”

  As I watched CC, Sampson brought a small leather box from the kitchen and set it next to the samovar. I thanked him and continued my questions. “Did Uncle get better after you dealt with Canton Sue?”

  Emily shook her head. “No. He got worse. Which is why I started to think he was also a victim of Lilian’s killer. Hence asking you to move in while we worked out exactly what was going on.”

  “Which was?” CC asked from the side-lines.

  Unwilling to answer him, I turned to Gold. “Bad form Uncle. Bad form. You set our investigations into the raven’s deaths back weeks; possibly months.”

  “Did I, son?” He spread his arms to emphasise his innocence. “From where I’m sitting you make more headway together.”

  CC’s handkerchief expressed his confusion as it went halfway to his nose, stopped and returned to his pocket. “I don’t understand, Miss Davies, what is your uncle up to?”

  I answered quickly, before anyone else could form a rational thought. “One of the reasons Emily came to us last year, was Uncle’s desire for an heir, CC.”

  My Cousin’s expression cleared; the handkerchief remained in his pocket. “I remember some-such nonsense.”

  “It’s not nonsense.” Emily gazed at my cousin through narrow, humourless eyes. “Count us both lucky Uncle’s sights were set on Sym, not you.”

  “What ... You mean ... Dear God’s! I’m a married ... God I am a fool!” I had the feeling he was about to say more but Uncle upstaged him.

  The reincarnation of every Old Testament prophet, the pawnbroker rose majestically to his feet and advanced on Emily. His cane was raised, poised to deliver a crushing blow. One, I had to hope, given the witnesses, wouldn’t prove lethal.

  “Peace, Uncle,” I said, stepping deftly between him and his niece. “If the case of Lilian and the others hadn’t involved antimony, Emily would have known sooner you were attempting to sidle out of the deal she made with Salisbury and bring us together earlier than negotiated.”

  I glanced at the samovar; my feet dancing excitedly within my shoes as I realised his eyes followed mine.

  For a moment, he did nothing. Then, grinning like the Cheshire cat, Gold sat down, clapped his hands – like one does at the end of a play – and smiled broadly. “When did you work it out, son? When you broke into Nanny’s house and stole the antimonial cup?”

  Shaking my head, I walked over to the samovar, opened the box and pulled out the tin chalice. “This is what Nanny and Uncle used to force Emily’s hand!” I told the assembled throng. “And somewhere out there is another one being used by the murderer of Robert Langley and Lilian Poulter.”

  “May I?” CC held out his hand and dutifully I handed it over to him. “It’s ... beautiful.”

  Knowing my cousin would be preoccupied with the goblet for some considerable time, I focussed my attention to the old man.

  “No. Not then, Uncle. I suspected antimony. But Bravo’s death was awful; diarrhoea and sickness. You just had one symptom – the sickness – which implied you had some form of immunity to Antimony. Trouble is, I couldn’t work out how that could be. Especially as you did a really good job of diverting my attention from finding out about the old country, with the other little jobs you asked me to do whilst I was here.”

  “Son, I ask again ... when?” Gold – as always – a persistent soul, remained determined to bring the conversation around to his way of thinking.

  I conceded a small point in the rubber of my mental bridge game to him. “Mohandas told you, in CC’s hearing, that given the amount of antimony in your system, you should be dead. That there was not enough gold in the world to save you; and yet you came bouncing back, time after time.” I told him, hoping it would be enough. It wasn’t of course.

  “Please son, get to the point. Like you don’t tolerate bullies, I don’t tolerate being dragged around the houses.” As he spoke, Gold raised his hand causing the eyes of his crow’s head ring to glisten in the firelight. “I ask a reasonable question. Am I wrong to expect a reasonable answer?”

  I looked at Emily who nodded imperceptibly. “The last piece fell into place tonight, Mr Gold.” Sure of my ground, I reverted to the formality that always came when unmasking a crime. “You were always careful never to tell me where exactly in the old country you came from until you told me about Tula.”

  The amusement and bonhomie returned. “There that wasn’t difficult was it? And now you know, son, tell me one thing: how did we do it?”

  Unsure how to continue but taking comfort from the fact I was still ‘son’ I decided to choose my words carefully. “Simple. Nanny used the antimonial cup to concoct a lethal dose. It had to be. A little ill and Emily would never be able to convince me to become her lover. No, for her to proposition me, after making it so clear last year she would never be my mistress, you needed to scare Emily for real.”

  The beak of his ring tapped the arm of the chair. “One of these days, son, you’ll get to the point. If I have been poisoned by a seemingly lethal dose of antimony, how come I’m still here?”

  And with that, I pounced. “Like me and CC, you went swimming, in rivers.”

  “All boys swim.” He replied evenly.

  My lips curled with amusement. “But not all boys get schistosomiasis... snail fever.”

  Gold’s soul went dark, his accent more pronounced. “Your point being?”

  “Nanny told us you were lucky to survive.”

  “And?”

  “Its cure is antimony. So that would have given you immunity to the worst effects of the poison. But to make sure, the tablets Mohandas gives you contain gold. A cure for antimonial poisoning.” My tale told, my unmasking done, I retired from the stage. I think I expected laughter, perhaps a ruefully expressed apology.

  Instead...

  “You bastard!” Emily’s criticism broke the moment.

  A collective intake of breath from Niall and Jethro sucked all but a little life from the room. I stared at CC. He wore his worry like armour as he assessed every exit and escape route. Worry that grew exponentially as he realised there were none.

  The eyes in Gold’s crow ring flashed again. “Choose your words carefully Emily Davies. Just because I love you doesn’t mean you’re indispensable. Now, tell me ... this arrangement with the earl?” The words were soft, but they promised dire retribution, should her answer not be to his liking.

  “A con,” Emily told him bluntly. “Like he told you. A way of finding out what you were up to.”

  And at that moment the room went dark around the edges. Fading everything and everyone out; until only the three of us remained. I wanted to cross the short distance to Emily’s side, but I didn’t dare. So, I stayed mum and fearful as CC – somewhere in the fog – put a restraining hand on my knee. A reminder to keep out of this world.

  “I see.”

  I glanced at Gold’s henchmen and found my fears, reflected in their faces. This was the first time Emily had gone toe to toe with her uncle like this, and they were frightened. For her, certainly, but also for the future of the organisation they protected.

  Meeting his gaze, Emily walked to her uncle, and pressing the key to this beautiful little house into his unresisting hands, she dropped to he
r knees: her hands outstretched, the tattoo facing upwards. “I am Impereye, I am yours. I take my punishment. Just leave Sym alone. He came here because I asked him. He’s done this for me.”

  Solomon like, Gold didn’t answer, just waited and held the silence ...

  Until I felt a whore for watching.

  “The Impereye cannot wait much longer, bubbeleh. In twenty years... I hate to think what this world will look like.” His four-fingered hand lifted Emily’s chin and – for what seemed like forever – Gold stared into those cornflower blue eyes of hers - lost. “By 1940 it will be unrecognisable. A true holocaust - and I doubt our phoenix will rise from its ashes.” Seemingly broken by his prophecy, he turned to me. “Is there a chance of an heir, son?”

  Words failing me, I shook my head.

  “I see.” Emotions too complex to identify washed over the old man’s face until, like the spider he was, he shed them like that creature sheds its skin.

  Trailing a finger down her cheek, a father wiping away the tears of a child too proud to admit she cried, Gold added: “It seems I’ve underestimated you for a second time. I should have been more open with my trickery. However ...”

  He moved suddenly, grabbing Emily’s arm and wrenching it upwards. A stubby bladed knife appeared from nowhere and nicked the skin under her tattoo. A simple, single line that drew one then two drops of blood.

  Tears glistened in my Emily’s eyes, but she held the old man’s regard steadily enough. “I’m sorry Uncle.”

  “And so am I” he said with genuine emotion. “You only have six lives left. Don’t blow them with defiance.”

  The knife vanished as did the danger.

  CC lifted his hand from my knee. “Breathe idiot! She’s got off lightly.”

  And justly admonished, I did as my cousin advised. Emily completed the Impereye fealty ritual and accepted Gold’s proffered sweet.

  As his retinue departed for the kitchen, Gold put the key on the table and made a great show of preparing to head out into the city. “Emily, until this case of yours is over, you will stay with the earl. See if you can overcome your dislike of the duty you are tasked with. He’s not a bad man and you do like him. Son: a word.”