by Carol Hedges
It is only when the cab drops her at the end of the street that Hyacinth suddenly remembers her original stated purpose in leaving the house, and realises that in all the excitement, she has clean forgotten to buy any treacle for the treacle tart.
****
It has been a busy day at Morbid Crevice’s dolly shop. From the moment Tonkin took down the shutters, the same customers who came in on Friday to redeem their belongings for the weekend have reappeared to pawn them again.
A brief lull in proceedings has prompted Crevice to dispatch Tonkin on a quick errand, the instructions accompanied by a box round the ears and the advice that if he chooses to take all bloody day, he might return to find the shop door closed, and he will be out of work, out on his ear, and have to sleep in the gutter.
The departure of Tonkin is followed a short while later by the appearance of a stranger – for Crevice has his regulars and his irregulars, and this man fits into neither category. He enters the shop furtively, his left arm folded protectively over a newspaper-wrapped parcel, and approaches the dusty, finger-smeared counter.
Crevice steps forward, giving the man the leering grimace that passes for customer service.
“Yers, young sir, ’ow may I ’elp you?”
The man eyes him with distaste. He places the parcel on the counter.
“How much will you advance me for this?”
Crevice’s fingers fumble the parcel. Inside is an ornate silver frame, empty of its contents. He turns it over, noting the hallmark. Then he flicks it between thumb and forefinger and brings it to his ear. He vaguely recalls having seen someone in the trade doing this, although whether it was to test gold, or silver, or cut crystal, he can’t remember. Maybe it was cigars. Whatever it was supposed to be, his ragged clientele is always impressed by such evidences of his expertise.
The man waits impassively, showing no emotions of any kind.
Crevice eyes his customer narrowly. He has a good eye for a bad guy, and he is pretty sure that the item in his hand has not been come by honestly. The very fact that the stranger has washed up here in his emporium is proof of that. There are many bigger, more legit businesses, not a stone’s throw from his door, where a customer could get far more money for a solid silver frame.
And yet the man doesn’t seem like a wrong ’un. His clothes, clearly need of a little care and attention, look like they are expensive. Or were expensive, once. He certainly speaks better than the usual patrons. Crevice is puzzled, but decides it is none of his business. His business is doing business. He cuts to the chase and names a sum.
The man swallows hard, seems to hesitate, then nods. Crevice digs out his cash box from under the counter, unlocks it and carefully counts out the money. The man thrusts it into an inner pocket and turns to leave.
Just as he reaches the door, Tonkin bursts in, panting. He draws aside to let the man pass, staring hard at him, as he walks out into the teeming street.
“What did he want?” Tonkin asks, when Crevice has welcomed him back into the fold with a blow.
“Why? What’s it to you?” Crevice snarls. “You know him - do yer? Friend of yours?”
Tonkin shakes his head. He certainly does not know the man, who is beating a path to the nearest chemist and druggist shop. He has seen him though. Oh yes, he is quite sure about that. Seen him through the shuttered shop window one dark night. But on that occasion, he looked different. Very different indeed.
****
Meanwhile Detective Inspector Stride is poring over a map of the West End, specifically the area around Regent Street and New Oxford Street. On it he has marked the locations where the three murders took place. He has joined the locations up with straight lines. Now he is staring at the triangulation he has created and racking his brains to work out some sort of connecting principle.
It is not the first time in his career that Stride has had to deal with multiple murders. He recalls the Case of Eileen Mannington, a singularly ugly woman who nevertheless managed to attract the attentions of three suitors, and dispatched each of them in quick succession. In that case the murder weapon came in powder form – rat poison mixed in their food.
There was the Case of the Four Students and the Sexton’s Umbrella, and the Case of the Bankers’ Thumbs, all involving multiple murders committed by one single individual. Not forgetting the Case of the Haunted Hansom.
There is always a pattern. Sometimes it is a cry for help, with the murderer leaving small coded messages as if he is trying to get somebody to stop him. Stride considers the clumsy attempt by this murderer to cut out the heart of each victim. What is he trying to show? What does it signify? A thwarted love affair, perhaps?
Also, there is always a motive – the primary ones being money and sex. But here, Stride’s logic runs up against reality. None of the three victims possessed anything of value, and although the murders have been violent and brutal, no sexual assault has taken place.
What is also nagging away at him like a sore tooth is the sudden cessation of activity. Apart from the Cremorne murder, which, as he suspected, was a different case altogether and for which a member of the Guards is currently being held on suspicion, there has been nothing for some time.
In his experience, most men who kill more than once possess a kind of self-destructive passion that ends up by betraying them. This man, however, seems to have the ability to lie low, as if he suspects that someone is on to him.
He clearly hasn’t read the newspapers, Stride thinks ruefully. The daily diet of scare stories, accompanied by damning accusations of police incompetence, are enough to give any potential murder the feeling that he will never be captured and can easily escape the hangman’s noose.
No, Stride reasons, there must be a pattern. There is always a pattern. Not because the killer plans it, but because all humans are creatures of habit. It is just a case of finding what this particular creature’s habits are.
A knock at the door heralds the entrance of Detective Sergeant Cully bearing a cup of black coffee. Stride waves at the spread-out map on his desk.
“Three murders in three separate locations. All within walking distance of one another. What do you make of it, Jack?”
Cully sets the coffee cup down carefully, trying not to put it on top of any important paperwork – no mean feat, given the state of Stride’s desk. Then he stares at the map.
“It’s four murders now,” he says grimly. “The body of a young woman has been discovered in a side alleyway behind a shop off Tottenham Court Road. Murdered last night. I have been at the scene since first light making notes. Throat cut, blows to the head, bodice ripped, injuries to the chest, nothing stolen, body propped up against a wall. Exactly like the others. They’ve just brought her body into the morgue.”
Stride stares down into the cup, as if he can see something nasty lurking its inky depths. He feels a tightness in his chest, a sense of vertigo, as if the world is spinning out of control round him and there is nothing to hold on to.
“Are you alright?” Cully asks.
With a tremendous effort of will, Stride pulls himself together.
“I’ll live, Jack. Which is more than can be said for that poor unfortunate young woman,”
He pushes himself to a stand.
“Let’s get it over with,” he says wearily.
****
“You’re keeping me very busy, detective inspector,” the police surgeon remarks drily, as Stride and Cully enter the cold, clinical basement room.
“Believe me,” Stride growls, “I’m not doing it willingly.”
“No indeed, I’m sure you are not. And I presume you would like me to comment upon the latest addition to the sad catalogue of crime once again laid out before me.”
“I’d appreciate that. If it would be no trouble, of course.”
There is an edge to Stride’s tone. It is noted by the surgeon and picked up instantly.
“Well, now ... that of course depends upon your definition of trouble,” he r
emarks, staring into the middle distance. “For the victim, trouble has been, one might say, her middle name. Young, barely out of her teens. Yet clearly acquainted with the moral irregularities and vicissitudes of this wicked world.”
Stride raises both his hands in a gesture of defeat.
“Just bloody tell us if she was killed by the same bastard who murdered the other three, would you?”
The surgeon clicks his teeth.
“Your lack of finesse will be the death of you, detective inspector,” he says, chuckling at his own cleverness. “Yes, it is clearly the work of the same man. The throat has been cut and there is evidence of the same ritualistic slashes around the heart.”
Stride breathes in sharply.
“Thank you.”
“It is no trouble, detective inspector. None at all, believe me. Only too happy to aid you in your investigations. It is, after all, what I am paid to do. I just hope that they will soon reach a satisfactory conclusion, before the streets of London begin to resemble a bloodbath.”
A couple of meaningful seconds slink by.
“What did you mean about the moral vissy ... vissy…?” Cully asks.
“Vicissitudes, detective sergeant. A word meaning a change of fortune. In this case, shall we say, a straying away from the path of rectitude.”
Stride gives him a hard-eyed stare.
“So, you’re saying that this one was not a dressmaker?” Cully queries.
“A dressmaker in the euphemistic sense only. This one, as you nominate her, followed a different profession. Without being too coy about it – as we are all men of the world here – the oldest profession in the world.”
“She was a prostitute?”
The police surgeon nods.
“Damn and blast it to Hell and back!” Stride exclaims.
The police surgeon raises his eyebrows in rebuke.
Stride mumbles a half-hearted apology, spins abruptly on his heel and stalks out.
They head back towards the main building.
“Our man is not just targeting members of the dressmaking profession,” Stride says grimly. “I had thought that was the underlying pattern.”
“So, what is the underlying pattern?”
Stride shrugs.
“I don’t know, Jack. I can’t see any. But there is one. Has to be. And he’s right, curse him,” he adds, jerking his thumb over his shoulder. “We must catch whoever is responsible for this before he unleashes a veritable bloodbath. And we have very little time and not a lot to go on.”
****
“Very little time” could be the leitmotif for that pair of most unfortunate lovers Portia Mullygrub and Trafalgar Moggs. But somehow time’s forelock has been grasped, and now there is a wedding to plan, a church to be booked, a dress to be made, a wedding breakfast to be sourced, and guests to be invited. Not to mention the most important task of finding somewhere to rent that is not too expensive for a clerk’s salary.
Here is the would-be groom mounting the dusty steps of the Mullygrub house. He knocks upon the door, which is opened by Cordelia, the half-grown sister. She is wearing a smut-stained pinafore and a terrified expression.
“Oh, Mr Moggs, thank heavens you have arrived!” she gasps.
“Why, whatever is the matter?”
“It is Ma and Porty. They have been going at it like knives since daybreak,” Cordelia says. “Porty has told Ma she is getting married and Ma don’t want her to.”
Sure enough, the sound of raised female voices backgrounds her words, punctuated by a chorus of high-pitched and miserable wailing.
Moggs hesitates on the doorstep. Who can blame him?
“Perhaps I should call another time?”
“No, no! Please, you must come in. Maybe they might listen to you.” Cordelia pleads.
She takes him by the coat-sleeve and drags him into the hallway.
Moggs follows her to the parlour, where Portia and her mother are facing each other across a table piled high with papers and pamphlets and cups and dirty plates.
Portia’s face is bright red, her hair stands out from her head as if it has been recently yanked by a pair of frantic hands. A smoky fire is making its own contribution to the already highly-charged atmosphere.
In a chair in the corner sits Mr Mullygrub, who works by night as a limelighter in the Colosseum and by day as anything that keeps him out of the house, but has sadly not managed to find anything today to secure his absence.
He has taken refuge under a blanket. Small sobbing Mullygrubs are clinging like grim death to his legs, as if terrified that the argument raging about the room might blow them out of the house altogether.
“Ma, Porty, see who is come?” Cordelia says, pushing Moggs into the eye of the storm.
Portia throws her Beloved a frantic and agonised glance.
Mrs Mullygrub, philanthropist and taker-up of good causes, pays him not the slightest attention.
“I say to you again Portia: how can you be so selfish?” she declares. ‘You know full well I have all my charitable work to oversee. How am I to ensure that the savages of Boongallonga get their tracts and missionary barrels if you leave me? Let alone the lectures and talks I must undertake over the summer. And then there are all the letters asking for subscriptions. I cannot manage without an amanuensis. No, marriage is quite out of the question and there’s no point in discussing it.”
“But Ma, Traffy and I love each other,” Portia pleads desperately.
“Yes, of course I understand that. You are young, and foolish. You think yourself in love. Maybe you are, but not now. Not when I need you here. And as I have repeated, you are far too young for such an enterprise as marriage.”
“I am twenty-two, Ma. And you were married at sixteen, you know you were.”
Mrs Mullygrub brushes the statement aside with a wave of her hand.
“Let us not bring my youthful follies into this conversation.”
The blanket quivers.
“And we have been engaged such a long time. And now we are decided to marry, and that’s an end of it.”
She stares defiantly across the table.
“And where, pray, are you intending to live after taking this rash and foolish decision?”
Portia flings Moggs a pleading glance.
“Traffy will find somewhere soon, won’t you?”
“I am searching for a suitable place for us to live, Mrs Mullygrub,” he says. “It is hard, as the good ones are expensive.”
“Aha! So you have not found anywhere,” Mrs Mullygrub states. “And until you do, no marriage can take place, can it? So here Portia stays. Where she belongs. And that is an end of it.”
And with that, the renowned philanthropist picks up a document, settles her spectacles firmly upon her nose and starts to read. Portia glares at her, then buries her face in her hands. Her shoulders shake.
The small Mullygrubs recommence clinging and wailing. Cordelia wrings her hands. Poor Moggs stares from one to another with an expression of quiet desperation on his face. Then shaking his head sadly, he tiptoes silently away.
****
Across London, Mrs Witchard’s lodger, having returned from the chemist and druggist and emptied a syringeful of reddish-brown liquid into his veins upon his return, now begins to stir. He opens his eyes to the sound of church bells, and a taste in his mouth as if he has been running. For a moment, he has no sense of place. The noise outside his window and the bed he lies upon mean nothing.
He blinks, and the world comes back.
There are shapes, patterns of light and dark, motion that corresponds to sounds arriving from outside. They knock at his door with luggage. Tendrils of memory drift through his gathering moments of consciousness. He pages backward, forward, back again, always chasing ghosts.
His nerves are pulled tight by too little sleep, and an oily slick of fear that clings to his skin. He never thought of himself as a good or a bad man. Nothing so simple. He was only ordinary. An ordinary man who just h
appened to fall for an extraordinary woman.
And now? This wasn’t the plan. His plan was better, it made sense. He has no idea what the sense of this is. The world has become frightening, impossible in its thinness. He struggles to raise himself in the frowzy unmade bed, but his head is spinning and he falls back on the pillow. He doesn’t want to think about anything. Just sleep. Sleep until eternity.
****
There is no sleep for Police Constable Tom ‘Taffy’ Evans, whom we last met on duty in a cramped Watch Box guarding the posh purlieus of Russell Square. He has got a new beat in the West End. Some might consider it a step down socially. They would be wrong.
A change is as good as a rest – though in his case it is not, as he is far busier now than ever he was when loitering within a box. There are crowds, there are fashionable shop windows, and fashionable ladies and gentlemen in their shiny carriages.
Street vendors and musicians ply their trade. As do pickpockets and petty criminals. Sandwich-board men stroll up and down advertising things he has never heard of. Every now and then the press of vehicles trying to get into Regent Street from Oxford Street comes to a grinding halt, and there is a lock, which he has to sort out as best he can.
As a consequence of all this, his letters home to his sweetheart Megan, who is in service in Cardiff, have improved considerably both in legibility and in content. Yes, it is fair to say that there is never a dull moment.
One of these anything-but-dull moments is about to arrive right now.
Constable Evans is swinging his truncheon in what he hopes is an assertive fashion, while wondering whether he might scoot quickly around a corner to perform an action that is becoming increasingly urgent as the minutes tick by, when somebody hails him from behind.
Turning, he spies a young woman in a very shiny-bright dress, a little short at the bottom and extremely low at the top. She has a small bonnet perched saucily atop stylish blonde ringlets and a slight swagger to her step, indicating that she is, in the local patois of the area, a lady in waiting. To be more precise, a lady in waiting for Mr Right, or at least Mr Right Amount.