The Business of Blood

by Byrne, Kerrigan

  Dr. Phillips held up his hands as though to protect himself from the baby. “I’m sorry, miss, but we’re not—”

  “I know. I know. Ms. Riley told me most childless couples want a boy. But think of ‘ow sweet she’d be, take’n care of you when you’re old. And keep’n your young missus comp’ny when you’re gone. She’s got all ‘er fingers, she does. And toes. And look, er hair might be red as yours one day.” She uncovered a tuft of copper matted to the little thing’s head. “No one would even know you din’t squirt her out yourself.” The woman—girl, as I deduced she could be no older than twenty—sobbed uncontrollably now, shoving the increasingly distraught child toward us.

  “Take ‘er, please! You seem like such nice folks. Dandy an proper. She’s even ‘alf Irish, like you, missus. She won’t survive one night where I’m go’n. The work’ouse in’nt no place for ‘er.”

  Dumbfounded, I actually took the child from her, only because I feared the poor girl would collapse, which she did. Crumpled to her knees right there in the walkway, a skinny pile of bones and rags.

  I turned to a gawking constable and sent him after Aberline. He’d want to hear this.

  A glowering Hao Long darted up to me, reaching for the baby, scowling with all the disapproval of a thousand ancestral grandparents.

  Gratefully, I passed the babe to the perpetual father, and he produced a curious amber-colored shard from the pocket of his silk tunic. The moment it touched the child’s lips, she quieted, emitting slimy suckling noises.

  Dr. Phillips and I looked on in stark amazement. What had he given her? Some sort of hardened sugar, I hoped. Or maybe honey. Whatever it was, I could have kissed him for it.

  Now for the wails of the mother. I smoothed my skirts beneath me, perching on the stoop as I rested a hand on the young woman’s shoulder. “You were bringing your daughter to Katherine Riley so she could place her with a childless couple?”

  “I got ‘er name from Jane Prentice wot sews in the factory. She got ‘erself in trouble but couldn’t take care of it because she’s Catholic, so she brought ‘er boy ‘ere. Said Ms. Riley put ‘im with a well-to-do miller’s family in Southwark.”

  “Does she perform this service for a lot of women who…find themselves in trouble?” I asked.

  “I’m not like ‘em. I gots morals,” she insisted, misreading the reason for my inquiry. “I was a married woman, respectable like.” Blowing her nose on a dingy handkerchief, she eyed Hao Long with open suspicion bordering on hostility. “Who’s ‘e? What’s ‘e gonna do with ‘er?”

  “He is my employee and father to many children of his own. Your daughter’s quite safe.”

  The woman nodded, trying desperately to compose herself, but she didn’t let Hao Long out of her sight. Whatever desperate circumstances had driven her to seek placement for her child, she did it out of love for little Teagan.

  “You want ‘er?” Mary’s dark eyes shone with a mother’s desperate, consuming adoration. “Look at ‘er now. She’s so easy to love. ‘Ardly makes a peep if she’s fed, see? I think you two live even more west than Southwark. Might could send ‘er to school. Teach ‘er ‘ow to speak proper like. Give ‘er a ‘ome, yeah?” She hadn’t stopped nodding the entire time.

  “Mary?” I asked. “Where is Teagan’s father?”

  It took her so long to reply, I wondered if she concocted a lie. “My Joseph, ‘e died last week in an accident at the docks.” She crumpled again, curling in over her middle as she dug into an apron pocket with filthy, trembling fingers. “I ‘ave ‘is last wages an’ me weddin’ ring to give to Ms. Riley to place Teagan for me. But they’re yours, if you want to cut ‘er out of the deal.”

  So, Katherine Riley had been taking infants from desperate or unwed mothers and placing them with well-to-do childless couples. Acting as a sort of unofficial adoption agency. That certainly explained the sparse child accoutrements we’d found. And the lack of a child for them to belong to.

  If both the mothers and the couples paid her, then her luxuries made a great deal more sense. The expensive carpet. The ivory teeth. The comfortable rooms.

  What she’d been doing for a living wasn’t at all legal, but neither was whoring.

  Besides, who was I to judge? I was sometimes little better than a grave robber.

  “I’m sorry to tell you this, Mary.” I rubbed her back as she wrestled with hiccupping breaths. “But we are not a married couple, and therefore, cannot take in your child.”

  “Oh.” She eyed me with a little more alert interest now. “I-I thought you kissed ‘im.”

  “Only because he’s a dear friend and associate of mine.” I looked up at him. “This is Dr. George Bagster Phillips, surgeon and coroner. We are here because Katherine Riley died under suspicious circumstances this morning.”

  Suspicious circumstances. Possibly the grossest understatement I’d ever uttered.

  “Oh.” Mary absorbed the information, then put her face back in her hands. “Oh, no. What’ll I do now?”

  I can’t say why I did what I did next. Maybe it was because her name was Mary Jean. Perhaps because she was pretty, young, and had dark, soulful eyes, and a stubborn jaw.

  Just like Mary Jeanette Kelly.

  “Can you work, Mary?” I prompted.

  She blinked up at me, wiping her eyes with her sleeve. “I can’t lift much for a while…” She blushed as she shyly avoided Dr. Phillip’s gaze. “I only ‘ad ‘er a fortnight ago, see. I in’nt healed up yet.”

  Cupping her palm in mine, I emptied the contents of my purse into her hand. “I want you to take this, along with your husband’s earnings, and find Teagan a nurse. Get a room nearby for a week where you can rest and eat. After that, if you’ve not found a better situation, call ‘round at 38 Tite Street in Chelsea. I live with my eccentric aunt, who is in need of care and companionship, maybe four days a week. Do you think you could do that?”

  She stared at the coins as though she didn’t believe they sat in her hand. “I—I ain’t never been no lady’s maid, missus.”

  “We’re only in need of a maid-of-all-work. Someone to make sure she’s taking care of herself. That she’s properly fed and bathed, and the house is tidy. Possibly to run a few errands here and there.”

  Her gaze darted back to her new daughter. “I don’t ‘ave no one to look after Teagan.”

  “You can bring her, if you wish. So long as she stays on the first floor.” I’d need somewhere to sleep away from baby noises at strange hours. “I think it would bring Aunt Nola some cheer to have a child to entertain her.”

  “She in’nt one of them dangerous looneys, if you pardon me asking, missus?”

  “It’s miss,” I corrected her. “Miss Fiona Mahoney. And the worst you can expect from Aunt Nola is that she’ll assign you and poor Teagan a few spirit guides. She helped raise me a long time ago after my mother died.”

  Clasping my hands in her strong, callused grip, she pressed a tearful kiss to my gloves. “Bless you,” she sobbed. “Bless you.”

  I helped her up, motioning to Hao Long to return the baby to her. She snatched Teagan away, though she stood passively as my enigmatic assistant placed the little amber pacifier into her hands and bowed before striding to the cart.

  I’d never been more grateful to him than I was at that moment.

  The constable returned with Aberline, who led Mrs. McBride and her baby away for questioning. I was happy to release them into his care. He’d likely offer her Leman Street’s warm, bitter tea and sandwiches from his own lunch pail as he’d once done for me. Then, gently, he’d convince her to give him information on Katherine Riley.

  “Are you certain about her?” Dr. Phillips asked. “She’ll likely steal from you soon as work for you.”

  “You’d have said that about me once upon a day,” I chided gently. “I was in this very position when first we met if you remember, sobbing and penniless on the ground in Whitechapel, nothing but a shilling and a broken heart to my name.”

/>   “I knew you were different. I always have.”

  “That’s very kind of you.” I could sense more than hear that Hao Long had patiently taken up residence behind me.

  “I’ll leave you to it,” Dr. Phillips touched his hat once more. “Good afternoon, Miss Mahoney. Don’t forget about the livers.”

  “I won’t.” I smiled, though the thought of approaching the Hammer for work was more repugnant now than it had been these past months.

  Sighing, I steeled myself for the job ahead, anticipating maggots beneath the carpet, which I’d have to take straight to the incinerator. That would certainly cut into my profits.

  I turned to Hao Long. “Please tell me you brought—”

  He held up my black over-frock and sleeve covers.

  “Thank you.” I slipped the frock over my dress and stood as he tied it behind me. I’d have to tip him handily for today. He’d earned it.

  No need to change clothing, I thought. The scent of death already clung to the fibers of what I was wearing.

  And, luckily, I was the only person of my acquaintance who knew how to get rid of it.

  14

  The next morning, I set out to discover whether or not Thaddeus Comstock was the man who’d cut my throat.

  If I visited him during office hours at The London Evening Examiner, the likelihood of his accosting me was dramatically reduced. I but had to hear his voice. Then I could elect what to do next. Go to the police?

  Or take a darker path.

  I was, as yet, undecided.

  I’d never forget that voice in the darkness. As soft against my ear as his blade was hard against my neck.

  Damn him for making me afraid. Shadows were hard enough to search for in the dark. How dare he become one more shade of mine.

  I was further disgruntled to find Croft’s shoulders supporting the weight of the Reinhold Building on Brompton Road, guarding the entrance to the Examiner.

  I shouldn’t have worn my aubergine frock with the violet cuffs and braiding at the bodice. It was one of my smarter dresses and boasted enough layers for a day that promised rain. However, it matched a dark hue in Croft’s cobalt paisley cravat and the pinstripes of his dark wool suit. It would appear to passersby that we complemented each other. And wasn’t that laughable?

  Oil and water, that was Croft and me. Two negatively charged magnets repelling each other by the very nature of physical law.

  I wasn’t the only one who noticed that he didn’t at all integrate into the bustling streets this far west in London. He stood much too rigid, too wary and frank in his observations of other people. Here in Knightsbridge, as in Chelsea, Westminster, and Belgravia, people nodded politely to each other in the unlikely event that their eyes met. Most went so far as to offer a well-meaning felicitation.

  Croft analyzed those passersby who dared notice him with unrepentant scrutiny. A great deal of them offered a cautious, “Good day.” If they were women—which most of them were, I noticed with a frown—he had the decency to reward them with a barely congenial nod.

  He drew deeply on his cigarette as he marked my approach, then picked a sliver of dried tobacco off his tongue before flicking both onto the pavestones.

  “What are you doing here?” I allowed my irascibility at his presence to color my question with temper. It took everything I had not to brandish the umbrella hooked over my forearm at him like a cutlass.

  En garde, Inspector Croft.

  “Waiting for you,” he answered, infuriatingly unperturbed. “I knew you’d be foolish enough to contact Comstock on your own but shrewd enough to do so in public.”

  Shrewd. That may be the nicest thing he’d ever called me.

  “I hope you weren’t waiting for long.” I swept past him and stood by the door to the Reinhold building, pausing to let him open it for me. It was half-past eleven, and business hours had begun some time ago. He could have been standing there for ages. I hoped his feet hurt.

  He wore no hat today, and I prayed the pregnant clouds soon birthed a mighty storm. I’d not mind one bit if Mother Nature decided he should spend the afternoon wet and cold and miserable.

  “Not long at all,” he assured me, sweeping the heavy door open with a mock gallant gesture. “I’m aware of the hours you keep, so I visited Comstock’s home first. When I didn’t find him there, I figured he’d already gone to work. And that you would be nipping at his heels like an angry lapdog who thinks herself bigger and a great deal fiercer than she actually is.” His northern brogue was more apparent in the West End, somehow, than in Whitechapel. Perhaps because Londoners spoke so crisply here, and his unhurried patois commanded more presence among the starched, hassled voices of higher-born or better-educated men.

  It took a great deal of will not to let my frustration show. How did he know what hours I kept? Until very recently, I’d barely stepped foot in his borough unless I had to.

  I wanted to snap at him, but I didn’t relish the comparison to the aforementioned lapdog. Instead, I decided to mine him for information. “How did your meeting with the Diocese go? Did you find out anything helpful about Katherine Riley?”

  “Your priest was there,” he said evenly.

  “He’s not my—wait.” I put up a hand. “What did he say?”

  “That’s confidential.”

  “No, it isn’t,” I protested. “All I’d have to do is ask Aidan what he told you, and I’d have every detail you do. Why not save me the trouble?”

  “When have we ever saved each other trouble?”

  I whirled on him, nearly dropping my umbrella. “We could, you know. As they’ve mentioned, Aberline and Phillips and every other officer of my acquaintance finds me most solicitous. Helpful, even. Why not you, I wonder? Why do you have to insist that our relationship remain so acrimonious?” By the time I’d finished dressing him down, my face was inches from his.

  He reached his hand out to the wainscoting in the tight hallway as though he might rip it away from the wall.

  He didn’t, though. He merely gestured for me to accompany him.

  We climbed the winding stairs to the third floor, where the offices of The London Evening Examiner resided. Croft took one step to two of mine, and I quickly became winded by my determination to keep up with him.

  I’d be damned if I let him into the offices first to control the interaction with Comstock.

  “You let me do the talking,” he ordered as we passed through the etched-glass doors and into the sanctum of the fourth estate. “All you need do is listen and confirm whether or not he is the man who accosted you in Crossland Alley that night.”

  I’d. Be. Damned.

  “How about you let me do the talking?” I sniped back, louder now that I had the clack of Smith Premier typewriters and masculine conversation to compete with. “He has a lot to answer for, and I know exactly what to say.” I’d been practicing all morning.

  “Dammit, woman. For once, would you—?”

  “May I help you with something?” A rather studious-looking clerk approached us with a cautious but friendly expression. We adjusted our spectacles at the exact same time, though he could look down his patrician nose at me due to his height advantage.

  “Yes, thank you. I’m Miss Fiona Mahoney, how do you d—?”

  “We’re here for Thaddeus Comstock,” Croft interrupted without the requisite pretext or pleasantries. “Which office belongs to him?”

  “Do you…have an appointment?” Alert now, the clerk glanced toward a specific closed door indistinguishable from a line of them along the back wall.

  Comstock’s office, I guessed. “I’m afraid we don’t have an appointment, but I’m certain he—”

  “I’m Detective Inspector Grayson Croft, Criminal Investigations Division of the London Metropolitan Police. I don’t need an appointment.” He thrust his badge beneath the clerk’s nose. “I’m here on a murder inquest and will speak to Mr. Comstock now.”

  He turned toward the unmarked door, having made the
same assumption I did about who worked behind it.

  The clerk fell into step with Croft, forcing me to walk along the lone isle behind them, lest my thighs bang into any of the several desks crammed into the wide room. I might as well have not been there for all the attention the men paid me. “H Division? What’s a Whitechapel inspector doing in Knightsbridge? Care to comment on the Sawyer murder? Or on the rumors that another Ripper victim was found in the Bilkington tenements yesterday?”

  So, not a clerk, then, I surmised. Just a poorly kempt journalist with dreary taste in suits.

  “That’s not your article, is it?” I chimed in, narrowly avoiding a collision with a distracted man deciphering messy notes. “Mr. Comstock is the one who broke the story, and our business is with him.”

  The man glanced back at me as if just remembering I existed. As if I weren’t the only female in the room, let alone the solitary individual draped in something other than black or beige. “And who are you again, darling?” He took my measure from the top of my violet velvet hat to the ivory handle of my umbrella, then down to the lace on my dainty Berk & Kessler boots, making it expressly clear how unimpressed he was by me. “Scotland Yard doesn’t employ women, and you’re too posh for a Whitechapel street doxy.”

  Croft’s face was suddenly mere inches from the startled journalist. “Piss. Off.”

  “See here!” the man blustered. “I’m Mr. Stanley Leventhorpe, the associate editor of the crime beat here at The London Evening Examiner. Thaddeus Comstock is my subordinate, and anything he’s published has been read and edited by me. So, in essence, his stories are my stories.”

  Blimey. I couldn’t have been more wrong in my initial estimation of Mr. Leventhorpe. Not only was he not a clerk, or even a journalist, he was an editor. And possessed of big enough stones—as my father called them—to stand up to a glowering Grayson Croft.