by R. N. Morris
His landlady was a Mrs Ibbott. She had a daughter, Mary, who occupied his thoughts from time to time, in a manner of which he was not all together proud. It was a dangerous situation, very similar to one that had got him into trouble as a young man, about the time of his father’s suicide.
Perhaps that was why he had chosen this particular lodging in the first place. Not for its proximity to Exhibition Road, or its generously proportioned rooms, but because it reminded him of the most humiliating and miserable time of his life. It was the emotional equivalent of a dog returning to its vomit.
Of course, Mrs Ibbott and her daughter knew nothing of the episode in question, and he was determined that they never would. Was he taking a risk in living under their roof, or was he proving to himself, daily, that all that was in the past?
He opened the door to a familiar homely smell. The walls had soaked up the vapours of countless meaty reductions. So that now the aroma of food was permanent. For once, he was back in time for dinner. Usually, the lingering ghost of it was all that was left to him.
The hinges creaked – as they did every night – as he closed the door. Mrs Ibbott herself peeped out from the kitchen to see who it was. ‘Mr Quinn! I wondered if it was you.’
‘Good evening, Mrs Ibbott.’ Quinn defensively clutched the furled newspaper he had bought from a vendor on the way home, as if he were intending to beat his landlady away with it. He held his bowler in the other hand, out in front of him like a shield.
‘And will you be joining us for dinner?’
‘Thank you. I will eat in my room tonight, I think. I have some important work to prepare for.’
He saw the honest disappointment in her face, the measure of her goodness. ‘But we see so little of you, Mr Quinn. We’re all worried that you are working too hard. Miss Dillard mentioned it only yesterday. She said the strain was evident in your eyes.’
‘Miss Dillard said that?’ The name provoked a wave of sadness in Quinn. He relaxed his grip on the newspaper. Now the wrong side of forty, and by some margin, Miss Dillard had once supported herself by working as a children’s governess. But that was many years ago. These days she was entirely reliant on the small income left to her upon the death of her parents. It barely covered the rent for her room, the smallest in Mrs Ibbott’s house.
As the years slipped away from her, and her hopes with them, Miss Dillard had fortified herself against disappointment by occasional recourse to spirituous liquor, her favoured tipple being gin. Her private income could not meet the combined expense of both alcohol and food. Being human, she naturally prioritized the former. Some months, if she ate at all, it was entirely due to the charity of Mrs Ibbott. From time to time, she drank herself into a tearful, stinking state, from which she was rescued by the appearance of her three married sisters (all younger than her) who would cram themselves into her tiny room for several days, nursing her back to health.
There had once been a suitor, or so the gossip went. The affair itself had been conducted so discreetly that it was practically invisible. The gentleman had been one of the other lodgers. A Mr Newlove, appropriately enough. In fact, Quinn rather believed that it was his name more than anything that poor Miss Dillard had fallen for. But it was not to be. One day, Mr Newlove disappeared, taking himself out of her life without a word of explanation.
That had precipitated the first of her alcoholic crises.
After she had recovered, she began to look at Quinn with something approaching sympathy. He was terribly afraid that she saw in him a kindred spirit; even more afraid that she might be looking to him as a replacement for Mr Newlove.
He found the possibility terrified him more than the prospect of confronting any murderer.
He also found that he had never quite believed in Mr Newlove, his name least of all. He had known from the outset that it would end badly. If people would only refrain from trying to forge these hopeless bonds of affection, they would spare themselves a deal of pain.
But tonight, somehow, he found himself strangely touched by Miss Dillard’s concern. How nice of her to notice, he thought. He also told himself that the period in which she had entertained romantic hopes on his account had long since passed. By now she must have realized that there was no reciprocal interest.
‘On second thoughts, Mrs Ibbott, I think I will come down to the dining room. It will do me good to have some company this evening.’
Quinn heard a voice in his head, Inchball’s: Dangerous.
‘Miss Dillard will be pleased.’
Very dangerous.
‘I wonder if you could have Betsy bring some hot water up to my room. I would like to shave before dinner.’
‘Of course, Mr Quinn. She’ll bring it right away.’
It was a high, narrow house, lives piled up one on top of the other. Quinn’s room was on the first storey. On the stairs, he passed Mr Timberley, one of the two young gentlemen who shared the other room on his landing. Both were employed in some capacity or other at the Natural History Museum, but they were far from being the studious scientific types that Quinn might have imagined. They were, in fact, a pair of droll wags, who took pleasure in baiting the other lodgers. Quinn himself had more than once been on the receiving end of their wit. But what irritated him more than anything about them was their habit of conversing with each other in Latin in front of everyone else.
They were just a couple of overgrown schoolboys, Quinn had decided.
He noticed that tonight, uncharacteristically, Mr Timberley’s eyes were red and moist.
Timberley brushed past Quinn without returning his greeting. He bounded down the stairs and dashed out of the house, slamming the front door.
Quinn closed the door to his room and looked around as if he was not sure what to expect. Is this really where I live?
The recent rain had abated and the early evening sun now streamed in through the large bay window, silhouetting the dark furniture.
I suppose I have to live somewhere. And here is as good a place as any.
The thought went some way to reconciling him to the room, which he had never fully succeeded in making his own. His efforts in that direction – purchasing prints to be framed and mounted on the wall, selecting books to fill the shelves, browsing the markets for knick-knacks – he had never found entirely convincing.
The room was comfortable enough. It met his needs.
Quinn sat in the armchair and turned the pages of his newspaper. It did not seem as though the press had got hold of the story yet, which was just as well.
An article on one of the inside pages caught his eye:
HUNGARIAN COUNT TO GIVE LECTURE
It was announced today that the flamboyant Hungarian aristocrat and distinguished amateur ethnologist, Count Lázár Erdélyi, whose arrival in London was noted by this correspondent last week, is to deliver a lecture this evening at the Royal Ethnological Society. The talk is to promote the publication of the Count’s latest book, entitled Killing the Dead: The Folk Beliefs and Rituals of Transylvania. Copies of the book will be available for purchase at the Royal Ethnological Society. Count Erdélyi, whose name means ‘Transylvanian’ in Hungarian, is recognized as an expert on that class of supernatural creatures which inspired the author Bram Stoker to pen his gothic romance, Dracula. When questioned as to the existence of vampires, the Count had this to say: ‘I have spoken to many people who claim to have seen such creatures. I have recorded their accounts. I have been present when the hearts of those believed to be vampires were excised and burnt. I have studied and analysed the variations and similarities of these cases. Certainly, belief in their existence is extremely powerful. It is as if we need them to exist.’ Pressed further on the matter, the Count revealed that he has settled the question once and for all in his book, which he would urge anyone interested in knowing the answer to purchase.
There was a knock at the door. The maid, Betsy, came in with the hot water.
‘Thank you, Betsy. On the table is fine.’
>
Betsy stood with her hands on her hips, regarding Quinn with a narrow, sceptical gaze. ‘What are you up to?’ she demanded.
‘What am I up to?’
‘That’s what I said.’
Quinn had an idea that he knew what this was about. ‘I . . . simply thought that I would take dinner in the dining room.’
‘I’ve got only one word to say to you. Be careful.’
‘I don’t know what you mean. And that’s two words.’
‘Miss Dillard. That’s what I mean. I hope you’re not intending to play fast and loose with her affections.’
‘Betsy!’
‘She feels things deeply, does Miss Dillard.’
‘I know that. I mean, I imagine you are right.’
‘So, you should not get her hopes up in this way . . .’
‘Get her hopes up!’
‘By encouraging her like this. Unless you’re serious?’
‘Serious? No! I mean, I’m not encouraging her. I simply said that I would join the others for dinner.’
Betsy shook her head, unconvinced.
‘What do you mean to say? That I am no longer allowed to eat my dinner in the dining room?’
‘I’m not saying that, no. You’re allowed to eat your dinner where you like. Of course you are. But the thing is, you always eats your dinner in your room, if you eats it anywhere. But tonight, you’re going to eat it in the dining room. Funny that, ain’t it?’
‘Is it?’
‘Oh, and it’s got nothing to do with Mrs Ibbott saying Miss Dillard had been asking after you?’
‘No, I . . . well, if you think it’s for the best, I’ll eat up here, after all.’
‘Oh! Men! Give me strength!’
‘What?’
‘That would just break her heart, that would! After Mrs Ibbott has told her that you’re going to be dining with the rest of them.’
‘Mrs Ibbott did what?’
‘Mrs Ibbott is very excited about it all. She’s helping her fix her hair. I don’t know what you said to her.’
‘I didn’t say anything.’
‘You must have said something.’
‘Only that I would join the others for dinner.’ Quinn felt the enormity of the situation crash down upon him. ‘No, this is dreadful. Quite dreadful. I can’t do it. I won’t do it. I shall eat out. You must make my excuses to Mrs Ibbott.’
‘It’s not Mrs Ibbott you should worry about.’
‘She will explain it to Miss Dillard. Something has come up. I have to go out.’ Quinn glanced down at the newspaper hanging limply in his hand. ‘I have to attend an important lecture. It is to do with a case.’
‘A case?’
‘My work, I mean. You will make my excuses, please.’
‘Well, I have never heard of anything so cowardly!’
‘Cowardly?’
‘Yes! Cowardly. You’re running away. You haven’t got the courage to face Miss Dillard and explain yourself.’
‘I . . . think it would be better coming from Mrs Ibbott.’
‘Cowardly!’
‘That’s unfair, Betsy.’
‘What are you afraid of, Mr Quinn? What are you running away from?’
‘This situation is not of my making.’
‘Could it be, after all, that you’re running away from your feelings? The feelings you do in fact harbour for Miss Dillard?’
‘Betsy, I don’t know where you got that idea from. Nothing could be further from the truth.’
‘Why do you say that? How do you know?’
‘How do I know? It’s my feelings we are talking about, I think.’
‘You would be the last to know.’
‘Is that really so?’
‘Yes. You men are hopeless.’
‘But Miss Dillard!’ protested Quinn.
‘What’s wrong with Miss Dillard?’
‘I think I am a little younger than her, am I not?’
‘She has not borne the years well, I’ll grant you, but that is because she has had a lot to contend with.’
‘I really must attend this lecture.’
‘She is a person, all the same. A person with feelings.’
‘It can’t be helped. I . . . I . . . I’m not hungry any more!’ Quinn cried, as if he believed this would put the matter beyond dispute.
At last, with much shaking of the head, and muttering of the word cowardly, Betsy left him to his shaving.
Killing the Dead
Quinn left the house in such a hurry that he failed to make a note of any of the details of the lecture, such as the address or the starting time. However, he had a memory of seeing a plaque for the Royal Ethnological Society during his strolls along Exhibition Road. It had piqued his curiosity, for some reason.
The evening was bright, the rain in abatement: spring flexing its muscles prior to taking hold. And so he went out without his Ulster. If he was unable to find the place, it wouldn’t be too much of a hardship to wander the streets until it was safe to go back to the house.
However, Quinn’s topographical instincts didn’t let him down. Almost without conscious thought, he found himself standing in front of the polished plaque he had remembered. The Society’s headquarters were a rather modest building of red brick and stone, tucked between two grander institutes.
The entrance hall had a dusty museum smell. Tribal artefacts hung on the walls: shields made of stretched animal hides, spears, ritual masks and totems. A glass-fronted cabinet displayed some rather dull-looking fragments of pottery.
A small crowd was gathering. Quinn glanced slyly at their faces. It was not a comfortable experience to get the measure of the company he was keeping: a rather eccentric lot, by all appearances. The men, in general, wore their hair a little longer than was necessary and seemed to favour untidy beards. Instead of Quinn’s sober black bowler, which he doffed as he entered, there was a preference for colourfully embroidered oriental headgear, such as fezes and tarbooshes, which they made no move to take off.
Among the women, he noticed a fashion for loosely fitting robes of strong colours. Bosoms were large and amorphous. Men and women alike raised their voices excitedly and gave the impression of being incapable of acting with restraint. Their eyes stared intently.
He had wandered into a gathering of Blavatsky-ites and freethinkers, he concluded.
The cost of admission was threepence, refundable upon purchase of a book. Copies were piled high on a table. Very well, thought Quinn. But he would wait to see what the Count had to say for himself before splashing out on one.
Inside the lecture room, Quinn was relieved to see that the audience already seated appeared distinctly more respectable. Predominately male, perhaps reflecting the Society’s membership, they waited quietly for the beginning of the lecture.
And they had removed their hats, Quinn was gratified to see. Mostly homburgs, he noticed, which they rested on their laps, pointing towards the platform expectantly. Quinn had been considering switching to the homburg for a number of years now. He wondered if its preponderance among members of this learned society meant that the time had finally come. Or perhaps it signified that he had missed the boat?
Suddenly, all thought of hats went from his head. He had caught sight of someone he recognized: the civil service mandarin he had observed leaving Sir Edward’s office.
He took a seat a few rows back, just to the side, enabling him to keep the man in view, without being seen himself.
It was not inconceivable that such a person, who was no doubt Oxford-educated, should be a member of the Royal Ethnological Society. Knowledge is power, Quinn reminded himself. Ethnology categorized the primitive peoples of the world and therefore subjugated them. The subject of study, as the word indicated, is always inferior to the eye, and mind, of the one studying.
Yes, he could see the attraction for such a man.
At the same time, the coincidence nagged at him.
Quinn examined his own motives for coming to the lect
ure. Leaving aside his wish to avoid Miss Dillard – there were any number of ways he could have achieved that – he realized that he was there because of the case. It was surely not unreasonable to speculate that the person who had committed the crime he was investigating had at least a passing interest in creatures reputed to feed off the blood of others.
An eruption of applause drew Quinn’s attention to the stage. The man’s name came back to him. Sir Michael Esslyn. He would try to remember that.
An elderly gentleman stood at the podium, waiting for silence. With his great white beard and bald head, he had something of the appearance of Charles Darwin in his later years. Quinn doubted this was the Hungarian Count.
No, Count Lázár Erdélyi, author of Killing the Dead: The Folk Beliefs and Rituals of Transylvania, was far more likely to be the man in the swallow-tailed evening suit and white gloves seated to one side. As a sign of his noted flamboyance perhaps, he wore a blood-red carnation as a buttonhole. His face presented a strangely symmetrical appearance: hair and moustache were centrally parted and held precisely in place with pomade and wax.
Aged about thirty, Count Erdélyi was younger than Quinn had imagined. His complexion was extremely pale. Quinn suspected this was due to the use of face powder. He had a small, budlike mouth, which he held puckered as if he were in permanent expectation of being kissed.
The applause subsided. The elderly gentleman began by making some announcements that could only have been of interest to members of the Society, and possibly not even to them. Once ‘the housekeeping’ was out of the way, he acknowledged the presence of the guest speaker, whom he described as distinguished. Count Erdélyi received the compliment ironically by contracting the pucker of his lips even further.
The sounds of appreciation as the Count took the podium were extraordinarily warm. Possibly it was the audience’s excitement at the subject he was about to address. But it was also true to say that Count Erdélyi cut a charismatic figure, especially next to the old gentleman who had introduced him. There was unmistakably something sharp and compelling about his presence. He possessed the space he occupied more intensely than other men. Whether you would describe his person as attractive or not is difficult to say. Nevertheless, you had the impression that here was a man who invariably got his way through the force of his personality.