‘I beg your pardon?’
‘I thought that if you turned down the perfectly good food I’d put in front of you, Mr Patterson, it must mean the end of the world was coming. But it seems quite a normal day outside.’
‘Thank you, Mrs Barnes, I won’t be needing anything else,’ Patterson said frostily.
‘Thank you, he says,’ the landlady grumbled to herself, as she made her way back to the kitchen. ‘If he won’t touch his food, he’s got nothing to thank me for, has he?’
Left to himself, Patterson lit up a cigarette—and even that didn’t taste quite as it should have done.
Mrs Barnes had been quite right in her assertion that the world was not actually coming to an end, he thought, but it was also true that his experiences of the previous two days had certainly soured his own vision of it.
The madam of the brothel on Waterloo Street would not get off lightly, he promised himself. He simply would not allow that to happen!
*
Every single police officer in the Northwich area had been drafted into the search for Margie Thomas, and the station itself would have been completely deserted had not Blackstone insisted that he and Inspector Drayman stay behind to hold the fort.
And so it was that when Horace Crimp entered the police station, he encountered not the duty sergeant he would normally have expected, but two detective inspectors.
‘What can I do for you, Mr Crimp?’ Drayman asked, in a tone of voice that immediately alerted Blackstone to the fact that the small bald man with a mouth full of bad teeth was not one of the inspector’s favourite people.
Instead of answering, Crimp produced a dirty toothpick from his waistcoat pocket and began probing his rotting teeth with it.
‘I’ve no time for your usual theatricals, Mr Crimp,’ Drayman said, impatiently. ‘A girl’s gone missing.’
‘So I hear, and very sad it is, too, I’m sure,’ Crimp said, removing the toothpick from his mouth, examining the results of his oral exploration that rested on the end of it, and returning it to his pocket. ‘Unfortunately, Inspector Drayman, the wheels of justice cannot cease to turn on one matter simply because another one has arisen.’
‘Mr Crimp’s a solicitor,’ Drayman told Blackstone.
‘I’d gathered that much already,’ Blackstone replied, sourly. ‘Are you going to tell us why you’re here, Mr Crimp?’ Drayman asked.
‘You have a client of mine locked up in one of your holding cells and—’ Crimp began.
‘I’m afraid you’ve been misinformed,’ Drayman interrupted him.
‘I think not.’
‘The only man in the holding cells is a narrowboat man by the name of Mick Huggins.’
Crimp nodded. ‘Just so. Mick Huggins. He is precisely the client to whom I was referring.’
‘You can’t be serious!’ Drayman exploded.
‘I can assure you I am quite serious. He is my client, and I would like him to be released on bail immediately.’
‘A child is missing!’
‘I’ve already made it clear to you, Mr Drayman, that I am perfectly well aware of that.’
‘And yet being “perfectly well aware”, you still expect me to take one of my men off the search, just so he can escort your thug of a client to the magistrate’s court?’
‘I object to my client being called a thug.’
‘I don’t care what you object to!’
‘…but that is neither here nor there, as far as the matter in hand goes,’ Crimp concluded.
He reached into his jacket pocket, produced a piece of paper and handed it to Drayman without a word.
The inspector scanned the sheet. ‘This is an order from the magistrate to release Huggins on bail,’ he said flatly, when he’d finished.
‘Indeed,’ Crimp agreed. ‘That is exactly what it is.’
‘But when did you...How did you...’
‘I paid a personal call on the magistrate. I explained to him you might find it difficult to provide an escort for my client while you have this other pressing matter to deal with. I suggested that, in order to make life a little easier for everyone concerned, it might be possible to circumvent the normal procedures if I were willing to post a bond of surety. He considered my proposition and came to the conclusion that that would be perfectly satisfactory.’
‘And how large was this bond you posted?’ Drayman asked.
‘That is really none of your business, Inspector,’ Crimp said. He paused for a second. ‘But since you seem so interested—and since I am always willing to co-operate with the police whenever it is practicable—I can see no harm in telling you it was fifty guineas.’
‘Fifty guineas!’
‘Indeed.’
‘A guttersnipe like Huggins couldn’t raise fifty guineas.’
‘You may be right.’
‘I doubt he could raise five shillings.’
‘Possibly not.’
‘So where did the money come from?’
Horace Crimp smiled, revealing both his rows of disgusting teeth in all their full gory glory. ‘Now that, Inspector, really isn’t your business,’ he said.
*
Drayman and Blackstone stood at the window of Drayman’s office, watching Horace Crimp lead his client down the police-station steps and out into freedom.
‘Now there’s a man who knows how to turn his weaknesses into strengths,’ Blackstone said, with something akin to admiration in his tone. ‘I particularly like what he did with the toothpick.’
‘Yes, that is one of his better tricks,’ Drayman agreed. ‘He uses it in court all the time. He gets both the prosecuting counsel and the witness so transfixed on the revolting things he’s doing in his mouth that when he finally asks his knockout question, it catches them completely off guard.’
‘I’d be right in thinking he regards honesty as an unnecessary luxury, would I?’ Blackstone asked.
‘You would,’ Drayman agreed. ‘He’s as bent as a corkscrew. If you want the law trampled on, twisted, perverted or otherwise made a fool of, then you go straight to Horace Crimp. Not that I can prove any of that, you understand, because no man’s better at covering his own back than our Horace.’
‘I’m guessing he doesn’t come cheap,’ Blackstone said.
‘And you’re not wrong. Any man who goes to Crimp for help needs to be earning at least a thousand pounds a year, or he’ll never even get through the office door.’
‘Mick Huggins doesn’t earn a thousand pounds a year.’
‘No, he doesn’t.’
‘And Mick Huggins didn’t ask for Crimp’s help, either. How could he have done, when he’s spoken to no one outside this station since the moment you locked him up?’
‘I’d dearly love to know who his mystery benefactor is,’ Inspector Drayman said.
‘It’s an intriguing question,’ Blackstone agreed. ‘But it’s not half as intriguing as the other question I’d like an answer to, which is why this mysterious benefactor thought it was worth springing a toe-rag like Huggins.’
Two
Horace Crimp’s office, much like the man himself, was run-down and slightly disgusting, but Crimp had never seen the need to spend money on it. Why should he, when most of his important clients had never been there—and never would go there—since, though they clamoured for his services, they shrunk away from having any close association with him?
Sitting in that sordid office now, Crimp looked across the scarred table at the narrowboat man who was standing at the opposite side of it.
‘Do you know what most of your business associates wanted to do when they learned you’d been arrested, Huggins?’ Crimp demanded. ‘They wanted to have you eliminated!’
‘Pardon, Mr Crimp?’
‘They wanted to have you killed, you cretin! Murdered! Done away with! But I talked them out of it.’
‘Thank you, Mr Crimp.’
‘There’s no need to thank me. I didn’t do it because I care a tuppenny damn about your worthl
ess hide. I did it because your death would only have complicated matters—and they are complicated enough already.’ He slammed his fist down on the table. ‘Do you realize how delicately balanced this whole deal is? Can you grasp the fact that it only needs one little thing to go wrong for the whole structure to come toppling down on all of us?’
‘Yes, Mr Crimp,’ Huggins said.
But he didn’t realize at all, Crimp thought. Huggins had absolutely no concept of the intricate nature of the machinery that had been constructed to see this operation through.
And how could he have been expected to have a concept of it? The man was little better than an animal, motivated solely by a primitive instinct to survive. Yet, paradoxically, it was the mindless beast in him that made him so valuable. For having absolutely no sense of right or wrong, he would cheerfully carry out tasks that would have turned most normal men’s stomachs.
‘You were specifically told not to draw any attention to yourself,’ Crimp said. ‘And what did you do? You not only got into a fight, you got into it with a bloody police inspector.’
‘I didn’t know that he was a bobby,’ Huggins replied. ‘He didn’t look like one.’
‘And what do bobbies look like? Do they all have pointed heads to fit under their pointed helmets?’
‘No, Mr Crimp, but—’
‘Besides, even if he’d had a notice strapped to his chest that said he was a policeman, you were too drunk to even notice.’
‘That’s not fair. I admit I’d had a drink or two—’
‘You were rat-arsed. Blackstone would never have beaten you so easily if you hadn’t been. But what’s already gone is no longer the point. We must concern ourselves with what happens next.’
‘Can you keep me out of gaol, Mr Crimp?’
‘I don’t know, Huggins. I really don’t,’ Crimp admitted. ‘But let’s assume that I can’t. If the worst does come to the worst, I’ve been authorized to tell you that for as long as you’re serving your sentence, you’ll continue to be paid, and that when you come out, there’ll be a nice bonus waiting for you. That is, of course, if you can keep your big mouth shut.’
‘You can rely on me, Mr Crimp.’
‘I hope so, Huggins. I really do. Because you know what will happen if you don’t.’
‘Yes, Mr Crimp.’
‘You just have to say one word out of place, and I’ll be unable to restrain your associates any longer. It won’t matter where you are—in gaol or on the run—they’ll find you, and when they do, they’ll finish you off. So you’re going to have to tread very carefully between now and your trial. Do you understand?’
‘Yes, Mr Crimp.’
‘You’re certain?’
‘I swear on my mother’s life.’
‘I didn’t know you’d ever had one,’ Crimp said cuttingly. He waved his hand in a gesture of dismissal. ‘You can go.’
Huggins got up, head bowed, and shuffled over to the door, but the moment he was outside the building he straightened up and began to walk with a much firmer step.
You had to act like these clever lawyers expected you to act, he told himself, but it didn’t mean anything. He hadn’t been half as worried as he’d pretended to be—hadn’t believed for a second that his assosh—assoch—whatever Crimp had called them would have him murdered. How could they, when they needed him to do the dirty work for them? Besides, he would be a very hard man to kill, and they must already know that.
But though he wasn’t scared, he’d continue to play their game, if that’s what they wanted. He’d keep his head down, as he’d promised in Crimp’s office. But not before he’d settled one outstanding score—not before he’d dealt with that skinny detective from London.
*
Ellie Carr had darkly predicted there would soon be another murder, and she had been proved right.
The girl had been discovered in some bushes, on a piece of waste land between two of the pottery factories, not four miles from where Emma Walsingholme had been found. She was wearing an expensive silk dress, and—like the previous victims—she had been horrendously mutilated. When Ellie Carr and Superintendent Bullock arrived, she was still lying where she had been found, though a police ambulance had arrived and would soon remove her.
‘Do you mind if I take a look at her?’ Ellie asked.
‘That’s why you’re here,’ Bullock replied. ‘But until we’ve got permission to go further, make sure it’s no more than a look.’
Ellie knelt down beside the body. The hands and feet had been removed, as with the other victims, but there was not an excessive amount of blood to be seen, so—again, like previous victims—the amputations had probably been carried out elsewhere.
She lifted the dead girl’s skirt. Her legs and thighs had deep slashes in the them, probably made by an axe or machete. From her reading of the medical reports on the other dead girls, Ellie had been expecting that, but she was still shocked to see just how regular they were, and how methodically they seemed to have been inflicted.
She expanded the area of her examination to cover the ground around the body. She had hoped to find some footprints, but instead of earth there was hard clay, and even if a man had stamped down as hard as he could, he would have made very little impression on it.
Had the killer known the ground would be so hard? she wondered. Had that been another part of his calculation?
She searched around for other clues—a thread of clothing, a personal item that might have fallen out of the murderer’s pocket—but she had very little expectation of finding anything.
The man who had done this was careful—bloody careful.
But then why had he chosen to dump the body in such a public place? Why not leave it somewhere in the countryside, where there was much less likelihood of him being caught in the act?
‘We need to remove the corpse now, ma’am,’ said a voice beside her and, turning, she saw a uniformed constable.
‘Of course,’ Ellie agreed.
She climbed back to her feet and walked over to where Superintendent Bullock was waiting for her.
‘I’ve been on the Force for nearly thirty years and I’ve never come across cases like these,’ Bullock said mournfully.
‘Have you identified the girl?’ Ellie asked.
‘Oh yes,’ Bullock replied. ‘She was carrying a bag—some kind of reticule—and it was left right next to her body. Inside it there was a letter addressed to her.’ He frowned. ‘The killer always seems to want to make it as easy as possible for us to identify his victims. Have you any idea why?’
‘None,’ Ellie said.
‘Anyway, her name’s Lucy Stanford, and she is—or rather, she was—fifteen years old.’
‘Which makes her a couple of years older than the rest of the victims, doesn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘But does she come from the same background as all the others?’
‘More or less. Her father owns a pottery factory a few miles from here. It’s one of the smaller ones in the area, but he’s still a great deal wealthier than you or I are ever likely to be.’
‘Perhaps the killings aren’t about the victims at all,’ Ellie suggested. ‘Perhaps your murderer has something against the rich in general.’
‘Go on,’ Bullock encouraged.
‘If you hated a rich man, and wanted to make him suffer, what would be the best way to do it? I think it would be to rob him of something he truly loved and could never replace. In other words, to kill his daughter—and not just kill her, but do it in the most ghastly way possible.’
Bullock toyed with the idea for at least a couple of minutes.
‘You could be right about that,’ he said finally. ‘But, in all honesty, I’d have to say that you could also be completely wrong. The problem is, Dr Carr, I’ve no idea at all what makes this man tick—and that really frightens me.’
‘Will you be going to see the parents yourself?’ Ellie asked.
‘I will. It’s not a duty I enj
oy, but it’s not a duty that I feel I can pass on to some other poor bugger, either.’
‘Would you mind if I came along with you?’
Bullock hesitated again. ‘I don’t want another scene like the one we had yesterday.’
‘You won’t get one. I promise you I’ll behave this time. But could I ask you one small favour in return?’
‘I wasn’t aware that promising me not to misbehave could be counted as a favour,’ Bullock said.
Ellie grinned. ‘You know what I mean.’
‘What’s the favour?’ Bullock asked, resignedly.
‘Don’t bring up the subject of an autopsy with them.’
‘And what if they bring it up themselves?’
‘Then try to give the impression that they have no choice about whether there is one or not, which legally is the case...’
‘True.’
‘...and would also be practically the case, if we didn’t live in a society where, if you happen to be born with a silver spoon in your mouth, you can get away with anything.’
Bullock smiled. ‘You’re beginning to sound like a bit of a radical to me, Dr Carr,’ he said.
‘I’m a scientist, Superintendent Bullock,’ Ellie countered, with just an edge of rebuke in her tone, a scientist who is dedicated solely to searching out the truth.’ She suddenly realized that she must be sounding pompous, and grinned again. ‘Which I suppose is another way of saying that whatever gets in the way of my doing my job properly is to be considered a Bad Thing,’ she continued.
‘Did Inspector Blackstone find it difficult working with you?’ Bullock wondered.
‘He might have done at first,’ Ellie said airily. ‘But he soon got used to it.’
Three
The previous evening Inspector Drayman had said he needed evidence before he’d entertain the idea of a smuggling racket in Marston, Blackstone thought, as he sat alone in Drayman’s office.
Well, now he had evidence—or something that came damn close to it—in the form of Mick Huggins. Because Huggins, a man of no importance in his own right, must be important to somebody else’s plans. Why else would that ‘somebody’ not only have posted a fifty-guinea bail bond, but also retained a crooked—but expensive—attorney to represent him?
Blackstone and the Heart of Darkness Page 11