A Matter of Grave Concern

by Novak, Brenda

  Jack smiled fondly at what he had stolen. “Right, my elephant. A pretty bauble, eh? And one she seemed to fancy. But you need to understand somethin’, Max. You’re feelin’ like a bloody hero, what with all the boys clappin’ you on the back. An’ I’m not displeased myself, overall. Tonight’s was a fancy piece of work.” He set his mug down with a thunk and leaned halfway across the table, nearly knocking everyone’s gin into their laps. “I’m willin’ to forgive a mistake or two because you’re new and you’re clever and you don’t understand how everything works just yet. But if you think I don’t got eyes nor ears in my head, you’re wrong. I hear the purrin’ of your voice an’ see the pretty-boy face beneath that black stubble. I see the way the ladies gaze after you.”

  He broke off to study Max for an interminable moment, causing the others to shift uncomfortably at this unexpected chastening. “You think you got me fooled. But I know you’re different from the rest of us. I just haven’t figured out how different yet, or what it is you want.”

  “I have a degree from Cambridge. I come from the other side of town. And I have been cut off from my family. What’s not to understand about that? In any case, what I want is not very complicated.” Max took a drink of his gin, sorely missing the fine brandy he was more accustomed to drinking. “I want some brass in my pocket like the rest of you.”

  “An’ we got plenty of that tonight.” Bill spoke up, obviously hoping to diffuse the situation.

  Jack glowered at his brother before returning his gaze to Max. “I know. You told me all about those gamblin’ debts and how they’re catchin’ up with you. And like I said before, you’re welcome to run with us as long as you remember one thing: I am the leader of this here gang and always will be. You forget yourself again, like you did at Aldersgate with that little lass, and you’ll find yourself the next bloody corpse we sell for ten guineas. We’ll see what the ladies think of you then.”

  With a wink, he sat back to drain his mug. “And as for the Hale bitch”—he punctuated his words with a hearty belch—“don’t be tellin’ me what makes us money.”

  Afraid of drawing Jack’s ire, the others buried their noses in their cups.

  Max shrugged. “Just trying to make sure you’re not letting your willy do your thinking. Because I don’t want to follow any man who does.”

  Alcohol affected Hurtsill in one of two ways: he became either the most generous drunk alive or the meanest. And from one evening to the next, there was no telling which way he would go.

  Max tensed, in case his words met with a violent reaction, but relaxed—marginally—when Jack’s face split into an appreciative smile.

  “There is more to life than money, Max.”

  The man was a pig. Shoving his chair back, Max stood. He knew his limitations, and Jack was pressing him dangerously close to them.

  “Where you goin’?” Bill asked.

  “Back to the house,” he replied. “My bed awaits and I am eager for it.” Grabbing his coat, he raised his mug in a final salute and hoped the others wouldn’t soon follow. He needed a break from them. He also needed some time to search the ramshackle house he shared with Jack and Tom before they returned.

  “Stay for another drink.” Jack motioned to his brother and the boy Emmett, who bawled out an old sailor’s ballad as if to convince him. “Another few minutes and we’ll be singin’ along with ’em.”

  Max curved his lips into his best approximation of a smile. Singing he could do without, but the thought of a good brawl once Jack sank a little deeper into his cups proved tempting. He wanted nothing more than to break the man’s jaw and be done with him. But that would have to wait. He wouldn’t jeopardize his search for Madeline.

  “Another time perhaps,” he said and slipped into the dark night.

  Long after her father and Bransby retired, Abigail paced in her bedroom, thinking about Max Wilder and the other sack ’em up men. She had originally planned to conceal what she spent on the cadaver by padding the cost of beeswax and tinder and everything else she bought over the next couple of months. But the members of the London Supply Company had taken all of her operating capital. The college could never get by. And trying to hide such an amount put her at risk of being accused of thievery even if they could manage without more supplies.

  Then there was her elephant. Her mother’s elephant. It was the only thing Abigail possessed that held any sentimental value.

  Pressing her fists into her eyes, she fought hard to keep tears from slipping down her cheeks. Although they still got the best of her now and then, she had learned at a young age that crying didn’t help. There was never anyone she could confide in, no one to comfort her. Providing her father deigned to notice her distress, he would shake his head in disapproval and grimace as he told her that he hated a woman’s tears. He didn’t know how to cope with them, didn’t know how to cope with a woman’s anything. If he found out what she had done and how badly she had botched it, she would be shipped off to Aunt Emily for good.

  So he wouldn’t find out, she decided. She would make it right.

  If only Wilder hadn’t taken so much. And the elephant . . . that meant even more.

  When she was a child and missed her mother so badly she could hardly stand the ache in her chest, she would slip into her father’s office while he was teaching in the anatomical theatre or handling patients at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital and crawl into the footwell beneath his desk. There, the smell of ink, leather and musty old books would surround her, helping her feel close to him. She would hold her elephant in her lap and let her fingers glide over the smooth ivory planes while the memory of her mother’s voice echoed through her mind.

  I love you, my beautiful girl. Why, you are no bigger than a faery sprite! . . . So you think you look like me, do you? Ah, you are far prettier than I, and so beautiful on the inside, where it really counts . . .

  Sometimes Abigail would stay under that desk for hours. No one ever came looking for her, other than Bran. And when he eventually dragged her out, she always remembered to put the elephant in its rightful place. Otherwise, her father would know she couldn’t simply lift her chin and carry on without Elizabeth as he seemed to have done.

  She wanted that elephant back! She needed that elephant back.

  But if she involved the police and accused the resurrection men of robbing her, Big Jack would retaliate by producing the letter she had sent requesting a cadaver, and her father could spend the rest of his days in gaol as an example to the whole medical community. If that happened, the college and its professors would suffer, too, not to mention its students.

  Abigail pivoted at the window. She could take someone to strong-arm Jack Hurtsill and Maximillian Wilder into returning her property . . .

  But who? According to the address she had used for that letter, Hurtsill lived in Wapping. Since the docks at St. Catherine’s had been built, the area had fallen to ruffians and the like, especially at night.

  What if she waited until the gang separated for the night and Jack Hurtsill was at home, asleep in his bed? If she had the pistol, she could coerce one man if necessary, couldn’t she?

  The odds were certainly better than when she had been staring at five . . .

  Or maybe she wouldn’t have to confront anyone. Maybe she could simply slip into his house and steal back her property . . .

  She sent a worried glance toward the clock ticking on the mantel. It was just after midnight. As fraught with risk as her plan was, she had no time to come up with a safer alternative. She couldn’t put off recovering the money; it would be spent if she did. She had to act right away, while under the cover of darkness.

  Suddenly firm in her convictions, Abigail riffled through her writing desk to locate Hurtsill’s address. He lived at No. 8 Farmer’s Landing. If she hired a hackney, she could find it. She just hoped Hurtsill would keep the money and the elephant with him when th
e gang split up for the night.

  Catching sight of her drawn face in the mirror on one wall, she paused. Was she really going to do this?

  She swallowed hard. As far as she was concerned, she had no choice. If she didn’t recover the money, she would be sent away.

  She had already lost her mother. She would not lose her father, too.

  Chapter 4

  As Abigail descended from the cab she had hired to take her from the college in Smithfield to Wapping, her heart pounded, but she drew courage from the awkward bulk of the pistol stuffed in the deep pocket of her cloak. Her father had taught her how to use a gun when she was barely fourteen, so she could protect herself should the need arise. It was one of the few times she remembered having his full attention. A woman living in a man’s world could never be too careful, he’d explained.

  But if everything went as planned, she wouldn’t have to fire a single shot.

  “Thank you, mum.” The cab driver told his horses to “get on up” as soon as Abigail dropped the fare in his palm. He was obviously nervous about having traveled so far into this quarter after dark, and for good reason. Everyone knew a cabby carried a certain amount of coin, which made him vulnerable.

  Abigail, on the other hand, had gone to great pains to appear as downtrodden as possible. Dressed in worn-out clothes that looked about to be torn into rags—a tattered skirt, a cotton smock she had hurriedly mended to make it serviceable and a threadbare cloak that hid her face and hair inside the cowl of its deep hood—she’d had a devil of a time convincing the cab driver to bring her to this location in the first place. He had demanded to see the color of her money before he would venture past Gray’s Inn Road. But at least his reluctance to trust her had given her some confidence in her beggar’s disguise.

  A fresh trickle of unease slid down her spine as the grind of the hackney’s wheels receded. But she took a deep breath and began to walk. If she wanted to go unnoticed, she had to travel on foot the rest of the way.

  She came upon three men, deep in conversation, outside a dilapidated house on Wapping High Street. Other than that, the neighborhood was deserted. Although a gas lamp burned at one corner, it provided only a dim circle of light that cast everything outside it in deep shadow.

  At least the rain had stopped.

  Wrinkling her nose at the terrible stench, she skirted several piles of manure that had been left in the street and began to follow the directions the cabby had given her.

  Farmer’s is one of the many alleys that run off this street here, second turn on your left.

  Careful to walk without too much of a sense of purpose so she wouldn’t draw attention, Abigail kept her head bowed and her eyes on the uneven cobblestones in front of her. As she passed the men, she could hear snippets of their conversation.

  “You can get hundreds from Billington for three- or fourpence a piece . . .”

  “I’ve got my own ratter. Maybe he’s not quite up to Billington’s standards, but he supplies me well enough . . . and you should see my new dog. He can kill twenty in four minutes, he can.”

  Much to her relief, they paid her little mind. She thought they would ignore her completely, until one tossed her a halfpenny. A shot of alarm went through her as the coin hit the street. She didn’t want to be addressed. But she shouldn’t have worried. When she played her part by scrambling to pick it up, the giver turned back to his friends.

  “What are you going to name this one?”

  “Billy, of course, after the best bull and terrier in the business . . .”

  Once Abigail rounded the corner, she saw the unusual crooked-looking house the cabby had told her to look for. This muddy court, lit by a single gas lamp, was, apparently, Farmer’s Landing. There was the typical water tap that served the whole street, the privies that did the same and the miskin—the part of the court where everyone piled their garbage. Neglected laundry hung, dripping from the recent rain, on lines strung from roof to roof, and moonlight glinted off the shards of glass from a neighbor’s broken window, which had been covered on the inside with an old blanket.

  Behind the standpipe, in the darkest recesses of the court, sat No. 8.

  Hurtsill’s house was quiet. It was also dark, which gave her a modicum of hope that he was asleep after a hard night’s work.

  She would slip in, take a quick look around and, with any luck, recover her property. If he wasn’t home, she would hide and wait until he was. She just had to remember to steal more than her money and the elephant. It had to look like a regular burglary, or she would leave her father and the college open to retaliation.

  She could manage that, couldn’t she?

  Of course. Soon, she would be able to go home, peel off her costume and be no worse for having met the men behind the London Supply Company.

  But approaching the house was the most difficult thing Abigail had ever done. Palms sweating, she circled wide, hoping to find a door or a window unlocked in back. It wasn’t as if they had butlers or housekeepers in this part of town keeping an all-night vigil over the silver and plate.

  What Hurtsill did have, however, was a big dog. The beast took Abigail by surprise, lunging at her out of nowhere. A rope attached to the animal’s collar was the only thing that saved her from those snapping jaws.

  Thanking the Lord the tree he was tied to had caught him up short, she hurried around the corner and pressed her back against the house just in time to avoid being seen by a neighbor, who lifted a window and shouted for the dog to shut its bloody muzzle. When the animal continued to bark and strain at its leash, the neighbor muttered something she couldn’t make out and slammed the window. Then, except for the dog, there was a long silence.

  No one came to the door of No. 8.

  Jack had to be passed out, drunk. Or he wasn’t home. That dog had been loud enough to wake the dead. If such a racket wasn’t enough to produce Hurtsill, she should be safe to venture within.

  But what if he hadn’t returned? What if he was still gone and had her money and her elephant with him?

  She was at his house. She had to at least check.

  Pulse racing, she crept up to the back door and put her ear to the panel. All was quiet.

  Hopefully he was inside; hopefully he was sleeping and couldn’t wake up even if he wanted to.

  He and his companions had made a fortune tonight. Any man of Jack Hurtsill’s character would probably celebrate with a few pints. But it was late. They should be home by now.

  Despite all her self-talk, her hand shook as she tested the knob.

  The door was unlocked. As warped as it was, she could probably have broken it, anyway. It wasn’t much of a barrier. But she preferred not to do that.

  The hinges creaked loudly as she let herself into a single room that was obviously used as kitchen, dining room and parlor. Moonlight streamed through the front window.

  He won’t be wary; he has no reason to expect me.

  She chanted those words over and over to herself, focusing on the positive. She definitely didn’t want to think about the thick, greasy hair and ogling grin of Big Jack. Or the incredible power in Wilder’s every move. Jack’s friend was more frightening than Jack, in some ways. But he had to be wherever he lived by now.

  Even if he wasn’t, she had a gun and, unlike Bran, she knew how to use it.

  She felt around for a lamp and the supplies to light it. Then she paused, listening again just to be sure. When she didn’t hear any sounds of movement, she proceeded to check the coat rack. She had seen Wilder put her money in his pocket. Since she had no idea where Max lived, she could only pray that Jack had demanded it as soon as they left and brought it here . . .

  There was a greatcoat hanging on the rack inside the living room. But that greatcoat didn’t belong to Big Jack. Wilder had been wearing it.

  Did they live together? If so, she would be outnumbered
again. But that could be fortunate, considering she had no idea which one of them had her elephant. She guessed it was Wilder. He had been closest to her desk at the end. But it could also have been Jack. He had shown more interest in it.

  The dog outside quieted as Abigail set the lamp on the floor. Please let the money be here, and my elephant, too.

  She didn’t want to come into contact with Wilder’s coat. Jack and the others rarely bathed. Chances were they bought their clothes from a pawnbroker and never washed them—and Lord knew what they touched on a daily basis. But, to her surprise, Wilder’s coat was heavy and well made and smelled more like rain than body odor.

  She delved into his pockets, searching for the ivory elephant and the purple pouch—but came up empty.

  God’s teeth! What now? She could scarcely breathe for the fear charging through her.

  But all remained quiet. There was no need to panic. She had free rein of the place, could keep looking.

  She turned to survey the rest of the room, which contained so much stuff there was hardly any space to walk: a sofa, several tables, a broken chair, a large steamer trunk, a washbasin she guessed was rarely used and a bin of coal against the far wall. The drapes hung at an odd angle above the window, but Abigail did her best to get close enough to pull them shut. She didn’t want the neighbors to see her light—if, indeed, anyone other than the man who had yelled at the dog was up.

  Once she got the drapes closed, she slipped off her hood so she could see better and began to search in earnest. Her elephant and money had to be in the house somewhere. Please . . .

  But that prayer wasn’t answered. She couldn’t find either. Could Wilder or Jack have taken them upstairs?

  She didn’t have the courage to look there—not under any circumstances. If she drew too close to the resurrection men, she wouldn’t be able to use her gun. They would wrest it away before she could fire. And there was no way out from the second floor except the stairs, which would make it far too easy for them to trap her.