The Women of Baker Street

by Michelle Birkby

  We had to keep going down, not just to the floor below, where they would be waiting for us, but right down to the kitchen below that. They wouldn’t expect us down there, hopefully.

  Eventually there was no more staircase; we had reached the bottom. Ahead, Mary felt around until she found the catch that opened the door into the kitchen. We practically fell in, gasping for breath, leaning against the huge cracked wooden table. Light came in through a grubby basement window, and I could see the massive iron range, and old pots and pans still strung against the wall. But here too, no one had been. The range was cold, and dust lay everywhere.

  We stopped and tensed, waiting for them to pounce on us. They still sounded so close. They were only children, but they sounded feral, and innumerable. But they didn’t know this house as well as I did. They were still upstairs, still searching for us. The other door between the kitchen and the rest of the house was bolted, and the bolt was rusted in place.

  The stair door slammed shut behind us before I could catch it and we heard the children pause as they listened, and worked out where the noise had come from. I quickly bolted that door, but the bolts were feeble, and loose, and would break at the slightest pressure.

  There was another door leading out into the garden. It was locked, and the lock was seized up, but the door was old and flimsy, and the frame warped. Mary shook it hard, and I could see the wood start to crumble. Then, as Mary fumbled with the back door, we heard them open the servants’ door upstairs. They had found our escape route. We heard them run down the stairs, shouting their triumph, only to be stopped by the bolted door. Mary slammed her shoulder into the back door, once, twice – and then the wooden frame splintered. As they hammered on the kitchen door, we scrambled over the remains of the frame, and out into the garden, and back into the street.

  I was shocked that everything was normal out here. I walked along, supported by Mary, each of us covered in dust, Mary’s hands scratched where she had fumbled at the door, my hair falling from its pins, both of us gasping to catch our breath, feeling as if we had stumbled from an horrific hunt, and yet, London still continued calmly all around us. People strolled by as carelessly as if there were not a house full of murderous boys beside them.

  Mary stood still, staring back at the house.

  ‘We should go,’ I told her.

  ‘They won’t come out now into the daylight,’ she said, and she was right. She knew so much more about these boys than I did. How long had she been researching them? What stories had she heard?

  ‘She’s there, I know she is,’ Mary hissed. I didn’t need to ask who. She meant the woman who had taken them. The woman who controlled them. The woman who, I was more and more convinced, had made one of them kill Emma just feet away from me.

  ‘Yes, she’s there,’ I said to Mary. ‘She’ll be watching us. Now she knows our faces.’

  Silently, Mary turned and walked away with me.

  A MOMENT’S REST

  We walked away, trying not to draw attention to ourselves, and looking for a place to rest and clean up before we went back home. If either John or Grace caught sight of us in this state I doubted we’d be allowed to leave the house alone again. We washed briefly at a public fountain, and then found ourselves in Regent’s Park, yet again. We were in a secluded spot, sheltered from the rest of the park by trees. We needed a moment to sit and think. Well, I did. Exhausted, I sank gratefully down on a bench under a great grey oak, stripped and bare. Mary pulled off her hat (a dark straw boater, as usual) and flung it onto the bench beside me. She walked – no, marched, up and down the path, hands alternately on her hips or running through her already disarranged hair. She was very upset or angry, I couldn’t tell which. This case had touched Mary deeply, more deeply than I had realized. For all her lightheartedness and flippancy, Mary felt things down to her soul. I watched her as she walked up and down, trying to arrange the facts in her head. Occasionally she would stop still and I could see her mutter to herself. Her breathing slowed, and her march became a stroll as she calmed down. Eventually she came back to me, her face rueful.

  ‘That was disturbing,’ she admitted, reaching for her hat and pinning it back on.

  ‘The house? Yes,’ I agreed. ‘Your hat’s crooked, tip it to the left.’

  ‘I thought they’d want to escape,’ Mary admitted, straightening her hat. ‘I thought it would be a daring rescue.’

  Well, that was Mary all over. Always wanting to save someone. Just like her husband.

  ‘They didn’t seem to want to be saved,’ I pointed out.

  ‘Why not?’ she pleaded. ‘Why did they want to stay? Why did they hate us so much?’

  Oh yes, there had been a lot of hate in that house.

  ‘Why didn’t they want to go back to their mothers?’ she asked. We were both wondering it – was Mrs Turner’s boy amongst them?

  ‘Maybe they don’t remember,’ I suggested. ‘Maybe she’s managed to persuade them their mothers don’t love them any more. I imagine she’s quite persuasive.’ Saving them was all very well, but what I wanted was answers, and a decent cup of tea.

  ‘I suppose so,’ Mary said, shrugging. ‘Do you think we ought to tell the police?’

  ‘That we were chased out of a house we broke into by some children we never saw?’ I questioned. ‘Besides, I expect the boys will move on. If I were her, I’d have more than one bolt hole. The Irregulars do.’

  ‘If you were her . . .’ Mary said, looking at me oddly. ‘I can’t do that . . . I can’t think like . . . like . . . someone like that.’

  ‘You think I can?’ I snapped, hurt. Although, I could. If I tried, I really could understand the way a woman like that thought. Collecting boys, children, for myself, making them love me, making them mine alone, replacing the boy I’d lost, hiding them away from the world – stop this. I won’t become like this. I won’t start to think like the monster of this piece. Not again.

  ‘I didn’t tell you how much this meant to me, did I?’ Mary said.

  ‘No, you did not,’ I said softly. ‘This is more than just curiosity; I can see that.’

  ‘Do you remember when we found the Whitechapel Lady’s body, and I was so angry?’

  I did. Mary had been shaking with anger, white with it.

  ‘I said the man who did this ought to burn. And then – well . . .’

  ‘I was only there to save you!’ I cried.

  ‘I know, I know,’ Mary said quickly, reaching out to me. ‘I am grateful, and I understand. But that night, there was something about you, when you faced him. Something strong and dark and cold. Truth to tell, Martha, I was a little afraid of you that night.’

  ‘Truth to tell,’ I replied, ‘I was a little afraid of me, too.’

  I still was. I had been strong and fearless, which was not bad, but I had then become cold and ruthless, and it still haunted me. Had I meant it to happen? I still didn’t know.

  ‘Sorry,’ Mary said quietly.

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ I told her. ‘Well, it does, but not between us.’

  It did matter. I hated her to think of me like that. I hated to think of myself like that. And yet, if I hadn’t been like that, we’d both be dead now.

  ‘No, it doesn’t matter,’ Mary said, slipping her arm through mine. ‘Let’s go, it’s freezing. Besides I want to go home and test this blood, and look at the letters from Sarah’s desk.’

  We walked off talking of nothing more than the weather, and books, and Mr Holmes’ Paris case. As we passed out of the gate, an urchin bumped into me, apologized, and ran off. Out of habit, I checked my pocket. He hadn’t taken anything, but he had left something. Billy’s first report.

  BILLY’S REPORT

  It was impossible to read the report immediately. We couldn’t stand in the street and read it, and 221b seemed packed with people. In reality, it was only Mrs Turner and Grace, but they seemed to be everywhere I turned. Mary went home to do the tests and write to the women in the letters we had discovered
at Sarah Malone’s home. She would send me a telegram with her results. I went back to my kitchen and spent the afternoon making meat pies with Mrs Turner. They weren’t up to my usual standard – I had kneaded the pastry too hard for too long – but she seemed to be impressed, telling me they were delicious. Grace, still hovering, wouldn’t allow me to eat any, saying my stomach wasn’t ready for such strong food yet. I wasn’t about to tell her I’d had a very active morning, including a quite dramatic escape. I was certain I would get a stern telling off. I had gruel, with Valentines Meat Juice added. It was a poor substitute, though I was promised I could eat cake soon, ‘sponge, not fruit, and only the lightest of sponges’, Grace insisted.

  I sent Mrs Turner home with another meat pie wrapped in a napkin. We hid it at the bottom of her basket, as she said anything nice or decent was bound to be stolen as she reached her room. I had tried to avoid thinking of her son all afternoon. Was he one of those that had terrified me and Mary in that house? If I had brought Mrs Turner there, would he have recognized her, and let himself be rescued? Probably not, I thought gloomily. They were all too far gone in villainy and subjection to their mistress.

  In the evening darkness, I sat at the kitchen table. Grace sat by the range, darning socks (I don’t know whose: there were no undarned socks in my home). By the light of one low gas lamp, I read the telegram from Mary.

  Blood, not human.

  Animal then. A ritual? A game? I put it aside and reached for Billy’s report.

  First of all, I am fine. Everyone is very kind. I’m being fed, and forced to wash my hands and face, and all that you do for me is being done, so don’t worry.

  Actually, this place is really interesting. All the servants are new, they’ve only come here in the past two years.

  Here Billy named the servants, all fifteen of them.

  They’re well paid, but they don’t like it. Like Wiggins said, I keep my mouth shut and my ears open. They like the master, Mr Langham, and the boys, but they can’t stand her, Mrs Langham. They say she’s nosy, and nasty with it. She reduced the parlour maid to tears the other day, teasing her about beaus. It sounds mild, but they say she can be really nasty about it. I wonder if she was always like this?

  I haven’t met the boys yet, and I know you think I shouldn’t, but Wiggins says boys in houses like this like to hang about with boys like me, just to see what we’re like. I haven’t met their nurse yet, but I know she’s sweet, Irish and sneaks cakes up to the boys when she’s not supposed to. I think I’ll try to get to know her – I know, I’ll be clever!

  Now for the interesting bit. You know how Mr Holmes can always tell where someone has been by the mud on their shoes? Well, being the boot boy, I clean everyone’s shoes – and I get to see all the mud!

  The servants’ shoes are mostly dust and coal dust and tea leaves and stuff like that, although I think the cook occasionally sneaks out to a public house, judging by the drinks label I saw on her shoes. The butler buys a radical newspaper, and when he’s read it, stuffs it in his shoes to keep the shape. The boys’ shoes are always covered in mud from the park. The master’s shoes are always clean, but they always have mud on the bottom too, the same mud from the park – but I never see him leave with the boys when they go out to play. As for the mistress – she’s not supposed to be able to walk very far. She has a stick, and she gets carried downstairs and out to the carriage. But she’s going out somewhere, at some time. She cleans her shoes very carefully before I get them, but as Mr Holmes says, you can’t clean away every trace. I found leaf mould on the buckle on her shoes. There’s no leaf mould in the garden, it’s all swept away, so at some point, she’s walked through piles of rotting leaves.

  I can see Micky outside, so I’m going to throw this out of the window to him, wrapped round a bun. He looks freezing. Once again, dear Mrs Hudson, don’t worry.

  Well, I was worried. It was human nature. But also intrigued. Leaf mould? Like the garden of the house on Henry Street. The case against Mrs Langham was building.

  Yet there had been other times when I was so very sure, and turned out to be so very wrong. I’d be foolish to assume leaf mould and a nasty character made her a murderer.

  ‘Nora wants to see you,’ Grace said suddenly. I’d almost forgotten she was there.

  ‘I’d like to see her,’ I replied, folding the papers away.

  ‘No, I mean, professionally,’ Grace said, with a little sniff. I was confused.

  ‘In her capacity as a nurse?’ I asked.

  ‘No, in your capacity as a sort of unofficial detective,’ Grace said. ‘She won’t stop!’ she cried out, suddenly bursting the bonds of professional behaviour. ‘Even though she was hurt, she won’t stop looking, and investigating and thinking.’

  ‘Ah,’ I said, understanding. ‘She has the itch.’

  ‘The itch?’ Grace asked, quite angry by now.

  ‘The urge to know the answer, and not stop until you know, no matter the cost,’ I told her gently. ‘Mr Holmes and Dr Watson both suffer from it, as apparently Mary and I do as well.’

  ‘Well, it’s not right,’ Grace snapped. ‘She was hurt, and yet she can’t stop going on about Sister Bey and what could have happened, and how it could all fit together.’

  Sister Bey? Well, she certainly was mysterious, with her two logbooks and her refusal to stir from her seat.

  ‘I’ll talk to her,’ I said soothingly. Upstairs, someone knocked on the door. Mr Holmes must have returned from Paris, and forgotten his key again. He always had problems remembering the small, practical details of everyday life. ‘Tomorrow. Can you arrange it?’

  She nodded as I went into the hall and opened the heavy front door.

  Ah. Not Mr Holmes.

  ‘Good evening, Inspector Lestrade,’ I said calmly, folding my hands in front of me. I had blocked this man’s way into my house in April, when Mary was hurt in the kitchen, and I felt he remembered it every time I saw him. ‘It’s late for a call.’

  ‘I was hoping for a word with Mr Holmes,’ Lestrade said, his pinched face shadowed. ‘I wanted to continue our discussions about the Richmond case.’

  ‘The Richmond case?’ I asked. I didn’t need to ask. He meant the blackmailer.

  INSPECTOR LESTRADE’S MYSTERY

  I was saved from having to reply by a familiar voice.

  ‘Good evening Mrs Hudson, Lestrade.’

  This time it really was Mr Holmes, walking up to the door of 221b.

  ‘Good evening, sir,’ I said, with a calmness I was far from feeling. I stepped back to let him and Lestrade into the house. ‘Did you find Mademoiselle Carere?’

  ‘I proved she wasn’t dead, which was all the French police needed to clear Madame Montpensier,’ Mr Holmes said, as I helped him off with his coat. ‘I suspect she’s gone to ground in America. It’s where a great many people find they can lose their past. I shall set my agents onto it.’ He handed me his Gladstone bag full of dirty shirts. I couldn’t read anything from his expression. What had he discussed with Inspector Lestrade in Dartmoor? I hung his coat up on the rack on the wall as Mr Holmes turned to the inspector and questioned him.

  ‘A breakthrough?’ Mr Holmes said, when the inspector told him. ‘I thought you’d given that case up entirely.’

  ‘Almost, sir,’ Lestrade said, as he headed up the stairs in Mr Holmes’ wake. ‘But I had the ground dug over one more time, and then I found it.’

  ‘Very persistent of you,’ Mr Holmes said. ‘Mrs Hudson, we’ll need tea!’ he called as they walked into his rooms.

  I went as quickly as I could into the kitchen. Luckily the kettle was just boiled (although a good housekeeper always keeps the kettle near the boil). I put together the tea things quickly, moving almost mechanically. After so long making tea for Mr Holmes, I didn’t have to think about it. I could hear them talking through the air vent on the wall, the one that led to Mr Holmes’ room.

  ‘No Dr Watson tonight?’ Lestrade was asking.

  ‘No, af
ter a few days away he felt an unaccountable urge to return to his wife immediately,’ Mr Holmes told him. ‘Why, do you feel tonight’s conversation needs to be chronicled?’ The voices drifted through the kitchen.

  I threw the last of the shortbread onto a plate.

  ‘You can hear every word they say,’ Grace said, looking up at the air vent, scandalized, although she didn’t move from her seat at the table.

  ‘Really, can you?’ I said quickly, pouring hot water over the tea leaves. There, I was ready. ‘I can’t hear a thing, I’m slightly deaf,’ I lied. Nevertheless, I closed the vent with a snap before I slowly headed upstairs.

  Grace told me the tea tray was too heavy for me, but I was adamant. I had been doing this for years, and I was well practised. Besides, I didn’t like anybody else but me to carry tea to Mr Holmes. I caught up my skirt a little between the tray and my body so I didn’t trip. I held out the tray at just the right angle to stop the plates spilling. I balanced the tray perfectly on my arm as I opened the door. But I was out of strength, and my arms were shaking by the time I set the tray down.

  The fire had been burning low (I had ordered Mrs Turner to keep the rooms warm in anticipation of Mr Holmes’ return at any time) and Mr Holmes was bent over it with the poker, vigorously stirring the fire into life. Inspector Lestrade was lighting the oil lamps on the table, and moved to one aside so I could set the tray down.

  ‘So, what do you have?’ Mr Holmes asked, as I poured the tea. Inspector Lestrade handed over a scrap of paper.

  ‘Found it buried in the rubble,’ he said. ‘It must have been protected by the bricks in the flames.’