Kill-Devil and Water

by Andrew Pepper

  ‘What do you think?’

  Saggers looked up from the drawing and shrugged. ‘I think she looks rich.’ He waited and added, ‘In which case, why was her body found on the Ratcliff Highway?’

  Pyke smiled. ‘Exactly my question.’ He’d clearly picked the right man for the job.

  Saggers gave a satisfied smile. ‘I’ve always said, give me the right raw materials and I’ll write you a veritable Beggar’s Opera. This is good, sir. It will permit me to indulge my creative juices. I’ll have it written by the time the newspapers go to bed tomorrow night.’

  ‘I don’t want tragedy, I want mystery. That’s how you’re going to sell the story. Readers love things that can’t be explained.’

  ‘If you buy me a half-buck of Halnaker’s venison, you can have anything you want.’

  ‘What I want,’ Pyke explained, ‘is to use the story as a way of appealing for information about the dead woman.’

  ‘Have no fear. A work of art can operate on many different levels.’ Saggers took the charcoal in his hand. ‘Social utility and aesthetic brilliance may seem to be unlikely companions to the uninitiated but in the hands of a master one can feed off the other as easily as a piglet sucking on his mummy’s tit.’ He grinned at his own analogy. ‘Where are readers meant to take their information?’

  ‘To me.’ Pyke paused. ‘Or to Fitzroy Tilling at the Whitehall Division of the New Police.’

  Saggers looked up from his pad. ‘Is this a police investigation or are you looking into the matter privately?’

  ‘A little of both - but that’s strictly off the record. You mention my name anywhere in the piece, and I’ll personally see to it that you don’t receive another scrap of information.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I can fudge the issue, make it sound official without mentioning names. Yet another string to my bow, as they say. And I know where my bread is buttered.’

  ‘And where your caked is iced.’

  ‘Actually I’m not especially partial to cake. I find it fattening.’ He patted his enormous stomach. ‘One last question, sir. You said that the coroner’s inquest had already taken place. What was the verdict?’

  ‘Wilful murder.’

  Saggers nodded. ‘But there weren’t any newspapermen at the inquest? That’s curious. Usually they’re like jackals feeding off a carcass.’ He rubbed his chin.

  ‘The inquest was a closed one. The jurors were warned not to talk about the details of the murder.’

  ‘I see I’ve struck a nerve of some sort.’

  ‘We found the corpse in a distressed state. We didn’t want to advertise this fact. You know how the macabre tends to attract all kinds of lunatic.’

  ‘Macabre, eh?’ Saggers finished off his ale and wiped the froth from his top lip with the sleeve of his coat. ‘Good Lord, sir, you know how to tease a hungry man, don’t you? You leave the tastiest morsels till last and then don’t bat an eyelid when you throw them down on to the plate.’

  ‘I don’t want you mentioning it in your story.’

  ‘But blood and gore sell newspapers; that’s how you’re going to get a sub-editor to sit up and take notice.’

  ‘Look, for the sake of the investigation, there are certain details about the murder that need to be kept from the public.’

  He didn’t want news of Mary Edgar’s missing eyeballs to become common knowledge. If the exact manner of her murder was reported, the investigation would become an overnight sensation and Pyke wouldn’t be able to move, or even think, for the howling of journalists looking to make their fortunes from the dead woman’s suffering.

  ‘And the more you sensationalise the story, the greater the competition you’ll face,’ he added.

  ‘Fine point, sir. I can see that arguing with you is like firing a pea-shooter at a rampaging elephant.’ Saggers made a point of closing his pad. ‘But if we’re going to be working together as a team, I’d appreciate it if you told me what we’re dealing with. I have a very developed imagination, sir, and if I don’t know, I shall be kept awake tonight, mulling over the gruesome possibilities.’

  Pyke took a moment to consider Saggers’ request. ‘Her eyeballs were cut out.’ He watched as the colour drained from the journalist’s face.

  ‘That’s horrible, awful.’ He shook his head. ‘But it would make a tremendous story.’

  ‘I don’t want it mentioned. Is that understood?’

  Saggers’ eyelids drooped lazily as he contemplated Pyke’s response. In the end, he just simply shrugged. ‘You’re buying the venison, sir, you can make up the rules.’

  Later, once Saggers had left, Pyke showed the etching to the rest of the drinkers in the tap and parlour rooms. He didn’t come across a single black face and no one admitted to knowing Mary. At the counter, as he waited for Samuel to serve him, he placed the drawing on the counter. ‘Do you recognise her?’ he asked, studying Samuel’s craggy face.

  ‘A fine-looking woman. Therefore, not likely to frequent a place like this.’ Samuel’s skin was lighter than Pyke’s but his thick, wiry hair and flat nose indicated his mixed ancestry.

  ‘I was told this was a place where black men and women came to drink,’ Pyke said.

  ‘Who told you that?’

  ‘No one you’d know.’

  ‘Since a couple of black stevedores were beaten nearly to death just around the corner, for taking jobs that could have been filled by white dockers, they’ve been keeping a lower profile.’

  Pyke noted that Samuel had referred to ‘them’ rather than ‘us’. ‘She hasn’t been here, then, as far as you know.’

  ‘That’s right.’ Samuel smiled, shaking his head and revealing more gum than teeth. ‘And a woman like that, I’d know. Believe me, I’d know.’

  ‘How about a man just off the boat from Jamaica by the name of Arthur Sobers?’ Pyke described him as best he could.

  ‘Ain’t seen him either.’

  As he prepared to leave, Samuel called out, ‘You could try again one night after the sun’s gone down. It tends to look a bit different then. Different folk drinking here, a whole different atmosphere.’ He placed a glass of rum on the counter.

  Pyke went back, lifted the glass to his lips, tipped it back and opened his throat. It was as though he’d swallowed burning oil. Gagging, he bent forward, hands on his knees, forehead popping with sweat. For a moment, his vision blurred and a flash of white exploded behind his eyes. The taste the drink left in his mouth was bitter. Pyke put the glass down on the counter.

  Samuel was grinning at his reaction to the rum. ‘They call it kill-devil. Most white folks drink it with a little water.’

  ‘Who’s they?’

  ‘Former slaves in the Caribbean.’

  ‘What does it mean?’

  ‘Some folk reckon it has medicinal properties; reckon it can cure all kinds of disease and perhaps even ward off evil spirits.’

  ‘Have you ever heard about the practice of embalming a corpse with rum?’

  Samuel rubbed his chin while he considered Pyke’s question. ‘Can’t say I have, but then again, I might not be the best person to ask.’

  ‘And who might be?’

  ‘Come back at night, any night, and she’ll be right over there.’ Samuel offered a gummy smile and pointed to a table next to the counter. ‘Buy her a few kill-devils, and she’ll tell you anything you ask.’

  FIVE

  It was late by the time the hackney cab dropped Pyke outside his uncle’s apartment in Camden Town. Felix would be fast asleep by now, and as he banged on the door, Pyke wondered whether he had planned it this way or not. It was true that he was slightly embarrassed that he hadn’t tried harder to win over his son, but it was also true that he didn’t exactly know how to do this; whether to give the lad a few days to get over the sight of him taking Maginn apart or to grasp this nettle as soon as possible. In the end, he’d dithered and done neither.

  It was Jo, rather than Godfrey, who opened the door, and as she led the way to the front
room, she explained that Godfrey was dining out. She had been sitting in the armchair next to the fireplace and an open book rested on one of the arms. Hurriedly she closed it and tried to hide it under the chair but Pyke had already recognised its leather cover. He didn’t say anything, though, at least not straight away. Instead, he excused himself, found a full bottle of claret in the pantry and returned to the front room with the bottle and two empty wineglasses, which he filled to the brim. At first, Jo tried to protest, saying she didn’t drink wine, but Pyke insisted that he wouldn’t take no for an answer and, finally, she relented.

  She was wearing a simple cotton dress and her flame-coloured hair glistened softly in the candlelight. Her cheeks were slightly rosy and, when she smiled, laughter lines framed her blue eyes. She wasn’t beautiful by the standards of genteel society; for a start she was too petite, no more than five feet tall, and her hips were too wide for her to be considered slim. But she was spirited and good natured and Pyke knew he’d never find a better governess, nursemaid and companion for Felix; for her part, she seemed to love the boy as her own.

  ‘I’m sorry, Pyke. I didn’t mean for Felix to see the fight ...’ Jo couldn’t bring herself to finish the sentence.

  ‘How was he? Did he talk about it on the way back here?’

  Jo shook her head. ‘He was very quiet. He’s been very quiet today, as well. But ...’ At the last moment she seemed to lose her nerve.

  ‘But what?’

  ‘He’s barely ten.’ There was a hardness to her voice. ‘Seeing that man close up, seeing the blood, I’d say it affected him.’

  Pyke thought about the way he’d beaten Maginn, and how it must have looked to Felix. ‘Did you see it?’

  ‘I saw that man lying in the gutter.’ She bit her lip and took another sip of wine. Her neck was flushed.

  ‘Did you know that Maginn was harassing a prostitute, and that he’d plotted to have me killed?’

  This time she didn’t answer. Perhaps she was worried about criticising him. Pyke wanted to tell her that he didn’t mind - that he wanted to hear what she had to say - but it didn’t seem appropriate.

  ‘Sometimes I see the way the world is and I can feel the insides of my stomach crawling.’ He looked down at his boots. ‘That’s not true. I see what I’ve done, the way I’ve let people down, and I want to tear out my own throat. But I’ve no right to say these things to you. I’m sorry, I should go. I’m not good company.’

  ‘You’ve only just got here,’ she said, fiddling with her silver bracelet. ‘Stay a little while longer.’

  A few moments of silence passed between them. Pyke took another sip of wine. ‘Did he talk about me when I was away?’

  ‘A little.’

  ‘In what sense?’

  ‘I think the fact that you were in prison frightened him.’ She saw his face and added, ‘He was scared you wouldn’t come back.’

  ‘And yet now I am back, he won’t talk to me.’

  ‘Just give him time. Losing his mother and then losing you, it was a lot to cope with.’

  ‘For a while, after she died, I thought he was coping quite well. I thought we all were.’ Pyke looked up at Jo and remembered some of the things they had done as a threesome; the long walks in the grounds at Hambledon, plucking pheasants that Pyke had shot with a rifle, and telling ghost stories around the fireplace in the old drawing room.

  ‘I’m sure we all still miss her terribly,’ Jo said, staring down at her boots.

  ‘But it was five years ago.’

  For a moment the only sound in the room was the ticking of the grandfather clock. ‘He so wants your approval, Pyke,’ Jo said, as she ran her fingertip around the rim of her wineglass. ‘I’d say that’s why he’s been reading the Newgate Calendar.’ She hesitated. ‘Rightly or wrongly, Felix believes that the stories represent the world you come from.’

  Pyke had learned to read from the pages of the Newgate Calendar, scouring it for tales of murder, piracy, highway robbery, theft and even cannibalism, and the idea that Felix was doing the same made him feel oddly satisfied, even if the reading matter itself was upsetting.

  ‘But now, in addition to that, Felix seems to have found a copy of Godfrey’s damned book.’

  Jo shrugged her shoulders. ‘That wasn’t my doing.’ She saw that Pyke was looking at the book she’d been reading when he arrived. ‘For obvious reasons, I’ve tried my best to keep it from Felix.’

  ‘I’m not blaming you, but the other night he came within a whisker of accusing me of being that character.’

  ‘I wasn’t even aware he’d read it, but when I asked him why he was so interested in the Newgate Calendar, he told me he’d been trying to find a story about you.’

  ‘About me?’ Pyke let out an exasperated sigh. ‘But I sat him down and explained I was only going to prison because I owed people money.’

  ‘Like I said, he’s ten and he has an active imagination. I think he wants to prove himself to you, though. Show you can be tough, too.’

  It was at times like this that Pyke missed Emily the most. Somehow she had always known what to say to Felix in order to reassure him. But he guessed that Jo now performed this role with equal aplomb.

  ‘Do you think it would help if I told Felix that I’m helping the police investigate the murder of a young woman?’

  Jo looked up at him. ‘Is that why they let you out of Marshalsea early?’

  ‘In part.’ Pyke shrugged. ‘But do you think he’d look at me in a different way, if he felt I was trying to defend the law?’

  ‘Spend some time with him; talk to him; tell him what you’re doing. It can’t do any harm. He’s quite resilient these days.’

  Pyke picked up the bottle of wine, and before she could stop him he had filled both of their wineglasses once more.

  ‘I see you’ve been reading up on me, too.’ He pointed to the copy of Confessions that she had tried to hide under her chair.

  But instead of an embarrassed silence, his comment drew a throaty laugh. ‘I thought you just said it wasn’t about you.’

  ‘It isn’t, but since I haven’t actually read it, I don’t know how often it skirts up against the truth.’

  ‘You haven’t read it?’ She seemed intrigued.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe because I’d be angry at the liberties Godfrey has taken with the truth. Maybe because I don’t like to be reminded of my past.’ He shrugged. ‘Or maybe because I think I’m both a better and a worse man than the one my uncle has written about.’

  ‘How do you know if you haven’t read it?’

  ‘I know my uncle.’

  That made her smile. ‘The character, he is rather ... coarse.’

  ‘And I’m not?’

  ‘I can see a little of you in him ...’

  ‘But?’

  ‘But he doesn’t come across as particularly intelligent. He does things, he acts, but he never stops to think about why he’s doing them.’

  ‘And I do? The man who squandered his fortune and ended up in prison.’ He laughed, self-deprecatingly. ‘But thank you. I’d hate for you to think ill of me.’

  ‘Why should you care what I think of you?’

  ‘Because you’re important to Felix.’ Pyke considered what he’d just said. ‘And you’re important to me.’

  Pyke had said this instinctively and, for a moment, he wished he’d kept his mouth shut. Jo seemed flustered by this comment and buried her face in her wineglass. She mumbled, ‘I was always under the impression you hardly thought of me at all.’

  ‘Why would you think that? For the last few years, you’ve been the rock I’ve come to depend on. I don’t know what I’d do without you. More to the point, I don’t know what Felix would do.’

  ‘I enjoy my work.’ She hesitated and bit her lip. ‘And you pay me very well.’

  Pyke stood up, faster than he’d expected to, and the sudden rush of blood to his head made him feel disoriented. �
��I have to go.’

  Jo stood up, too, and followed him to the front door. ‘Shall I tell Felix you’ll come and see him soon?’

  He turned to face her. ‘Perhaps the three of us could do something or go somewhere. The zoological gardens perhaps.’ He was aware of how close she was. All he had to do was reach out and touch her hand.

  ‘He would like that.’

  At the bottom of the steps Pyke turned around, expecting Jo to have disappeared back into the apartment, but she hadn’t moved and was contemplating him with an expression he couldn’t make sense of.