by Carol Hedges
Daubney slips down the basement steps. There is a strange ringing in his ears; his head seems bursting. Something dark and monstrous is rising up inside him, its wings beating in his chest. He smashes the brick against one of the side-windows, then uses his cane to clear enough of the glass to clamber through.
Once inside, he palms his way around the walls until he comes to the door leading up to the ground floor. He feels constricted by the weight of his clothing, but he climbs the stairs, one hand always supporting himself on the wall. Reaching the hallway, he makes his way in pitch darkness, towards the front of the house. There is a mantelpiece there and the Edo cat is waiting for him. He read it in the report.
One step. Another step. Suddenly his foot slips on a wet, sticky patch and he goes down, vainly flailing to get a grip on thin air. His hands reach out and touch a cold something that feels like … but … no … it cannot be! Gerald Daubney throws back his head and screams in horror as he realises what he has stumbled upon.
When the night-duty constable eventually gains entrance through the front door and switches on the electric light, he finds a black clad man with wild staring eyes, crouching beside a dead body. The man’s face has the pallor of a three-day corpse, and his hands are covered in blood.
****
Resolutions and conclusions take some time to outwork, and so it is a good few days before Stride and Cully meet to discuss and finally close the Flashley murder investigation.
“It was just as well that you and Lachlan were able to verify Munro Black’s suicide,” Stride says. “The outcome for Mr. Daubney, had you not, would have meant a trial for murder, leading assuredly to a guilty verdict and to the rope. Ironic, isn’t it?”
Cully keeps his facial expression neutral. To his surprise, Robertson has agreed with the presumption of felo de se as he calls it. Cully vies between amusement that their carefully structured set-up worked and guilt. Mostly he is amused.
Stride stares intently at the far wall. “That house again. It is almost as if it sucks in evil. If I were a superstitious man, I could well believe that it is cursed in some malign way.”
“Better not tell the new tenants, whoever they are,” Cully says drily.
“Indeed.” Stride makes a mouth. “Well, Munro Black is dead, which means our investigation does not have a satisfactory conclusion. We were unable to extract a confession of murder from him before he died. And we may have found an oriental knife amongst his possessions that matches the one dropped at the livery stables, but we did not find any of Mr. Daubney’s stolen property,” he pauses, “Do we know what has happened to the poor man?”
“I gather that some of his fellow collectors have taken him to a safe place, where he can be properly looked after,” Cully says.
“I did not warm to him, I own it. But to discover the body of a suicide, as he did, no wonder he was upset. We forget that members of the public are not so accustomed to the gruesome things that we encounter on a daily basis. So Munro Black has eluded justice, just as he has eluded us. I am not happy about it, I tell you plainly. It should have ended with that man facing the full force of the law.”
“We have the younger brother in custody in Calais,” Cully reminds him. “Perhaps he might be able to shed light upon the case. He will be allowed to return for Black’s funeral. May I suggest we pull him in for questioning when he does.”
Stride nods curtly. “We shall be at that funeral. I am interested to see who else turns up. The man seems to have made so many enemies. I expect some of them will be there just to check he is really dead.”
And some won’t, Cully thinks. Amy Feacham, for one. She and her family will still be on the high seas. He hopes they land safely and go on to make a good life for themselves in America.
There is a light knock at the door. Detective Inspector Greig enters. “Ah, gentlemen, good: I was hoping I’d find you both together,” he says. “I have some important news that I wish to share with you.”
Cully feels a frisson of apprehension. He has noted his colleague’s air of preoccupation over the past weeks, the staring off into space. And then there was the letter, put up quickly before he could inquire about it.
Greig moves a couple of folders aside and perches on the edge of the desk. Stride and Cully wait to hear what he has to divulge. “I am delighted to be able to tell you that Miss Josephine King and I are engaged to be married,” he says.
There is a nanosecond’s pause. Then both men jump to their feet, uttering congratulations. Stride shakes his hand. Cully claps him on the shoulder.
“Aye. It is amazing, even to me,” Greig says, smiling broadly. “I would have told you sooner, but I was waiting for a reply to my letter from Jeannie, my sister in Scotland. She is all the family I have, so without her approval, I couldn’t have asked Josephine. But she is as delighted as you both.”
“When is the wedding day to be?” Stride asks.
“We are hoping for a Christmas wedding,” Greig says. “And on that matter, I have a favour to ask: as I have no menfolk to stand up with me at the altar, would you both be my groomsmen?”
Stride’s smile is as wide as Africa. “My dear chap, it would be an honour ~ for us both, eh Jack?”
“Indeed, it would,” Cully nods.
“Good. That is settled then. In the meantime, we are hosting a small party this Sunday afternoon to celebrate the engagement. It will be at the Lily Lounge, of course. I hope you and your families will be free to join us?”
“Wild horses, Lachlan,” Cully laughs. “You wait until I tell Emily. She will be planning her and the girls’ frocks as soon as she hears the news. I am so happy for you. This is the best news I have heard in an age.”
“I agree,” Stride agrees. He picks up his pen and signs off the Flashley case file with a flourish. “Gentlemen, I think this news calls for a celebratory lunch. Let us betake ourselves to Sally’s, where I will stand you both a plate of the finest chops and a glass of something to toast the health and happiness of the future Mr. and Mrs. Greig.”
****
Sadly, alas, there is little to celebrate in this place. Sometimes it is light. Then it is dark. There seems no logic to it. Time has gone runny at the edges. He does not know why it has happened. But now it is light once more, and he is here, and this is his spoon. His. Spoon. They tried to take it away when he first came here. He resisted them. It is his spoon.
He picks up his spoon, turning it so that the bowl catches the early morning sun shining through the window of his room. Nobody will take his spoon away from him, as they took his cat. He still recalls her crying as she was picked up by the scruff of her neck, thrust into a basket and removed from his house.
That was just before he was put into a carriage and removed as well. He didn’t even have time to finish his pudding. But he kept hold of his spoon. And his dreams. Some nights, he dreams about her. Some nights, his dreams are of another cat. A small carved ivory cat. So small that he can hold it in the palm of his hand. A smooth cat, with green jewel eyes that shine. Whenever he dreams about that cat, he wakes up in the morning to find tears shivering down his cheeks and his pillow is wet.
Sometimes, he hears noises in the night. People elsewhere screaming and shouting. He hears running footsteps in the corridor beyond his door. After a while, the noises cease. Out there, on the other side of the door, are people who want to take his spoon away. That is why he stays in this room, with its white walls and bars on the window. And his spoon. They cannot hurt him while he has his spoon. As long as he has his spoon, he is safe.
****
Izzy Harding wakes up to find herself unexpectedly sleeping on the floor. Her mattress has been turned over in the night, tipping her off. She slides her hand underneath it to discover that all the treasures she secretly kept there have gone: the shiny brass button, the length of bright scarlet ribbon, the sheet of gold leaf, the six farthings, the miniature dolls’ tea-set, the green velvet pincushion and the silver sixpence.
The
re is no sign of her mother either. She suspects that the two events are not unlinked. Izzy goes downstairs, where Mrs O’Shaughnessy informs her that her mother came in very late with a man, both the worst for drink. There was a blazing row, after which her mother packed her belongings and left. This information is followed by the polite but firm request that Izzy follows her mother, as Mrs O’Shaughnessy keeps ‘a clane house’ and the Hardings are no longer considered suitable lodgers.
Now Izzy walks along the Thames foreshore, the hand of Fate snipping the threads behind her. Early morning light is slanting through the mist and her boots make squelching sounds as they sink into the black mud. Since waking up, she has lost all her treasured possessions, her mother and her home. It seems a lot for a person of so few years. She hopes the rest of the day will be more uneventful.
Izzy walks towards one of the great iron bridges that crosses the river like so many heavy rainbows. The light shivers, then settles. A ripple of sunshine. Diamonds dance on the grey water. At the foot of the bridge she pauses as something catches her eye. It gleams in the mud, ivory-white. She sees a small triangular face. Two pricked ears. Two green eyes. Izzy squats, scraping away the filth with a piece of stick. She reaches down. The Edo cat is gently lifted from its muddy bed.
Izzy rolls the thing she has found between her cupped hands, studying it curiously. She hasn’t a clue what it is. She has never seen anything like it before. She turns it over a couple of times, running a finger lightly along the smooth ivory back, marvelling at its small perfection, the tiny tongue poking out, the segmented paws, the cat-stare eyes.
She has found a new treasure. It must be a sign: the door to her better life is opening. Izzy Harding scrambles to her feet, tucking the Edo cat into her pocket. Then she walks on, gradually disappearing into the morning mist, like a figment of the city’s turbulent imagination.
Finis
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