Devoured (19 page)

Snow was falling and Hatton feared the search would be hampered, although Adams had given orders to swell the search party to twenty more able men. Sources at the local tavern proved good and the men were soon led out to Wickham Fen, a mile or more from Ely. Word was, the Mucker had a hut somewhere along the banks, but to the untrained eye, it was well hidden. They took a lad with them who had said he knew trapping and could act as their guide. With a nod of encouragement from the tavern owner and a shilling from Adams, the child seemed happy to oblige.

‘What’s your name, child?’ Adams asked him, as they set off.

The boy looked him square in the eye. Not frightened, as Hatton would have been at his age. He seemed fearless, despite the posse of men who stood with the Inspector like a pack.

‘Bob Feltwell and I know Wickham. My family, when I had some, were breedlings. I know the Mucker, too. He takes the best pikes but he’s getting creaky now, and I’m creeping up on him. Last summer I caught a nine-pounder. He stuffed it for me, for a mean price, the old miser. But it was worth it, for I sold it and ate like a king.’ The boy sniffed and rubbed his face as he talked. Hatton felt sorry for this strange child. Countless children who roamed the streets in London were far worse off than he, yet somehow his poverty touched the Professor. The boy’s hand-me-down clothes had been gathered from who knows where, and they were fit for a man of twenty, hanging off his tiny frame.

‘Well, young Bob. You find this Mucker for us and you’ll be supping like a king with a bevy of stove-piped Specials before sun goes down,’ Hatton said to the child, smiling.

The child, head down and trudging along the frozen banks of the waterways, replied, ‘Maybe. Though I’m not intending to sit with no Specials. They are not inclined to favour boys like me. I hide from the law, but if the money’s right, well, I’m here, aren’t I? I’ll find him alright. He thinks he’s the king of trackers, does Mucker, but I’m creeping up on him.’

‘Does he live alone, boy?’ asked Adams.

‘He had a daughter once, same age as me, but she disappeared. They think she was drowned in the marshes. It happens when the floods come. No one ever found her body, nor nothing to say she’d ever been alive. It was all the talk for a while round these parts. But it’s not so unusual for children to die here.’

And the boy trudged on along the icy boardwalks till they reached a flat gully of water, and then he skitted away, up a bank of snow. Adams stopped in his tracks and, twisting round, cautioned the men to fall silent.

The silence felt like hours. Had the boy given up? Adams seemed content to look at his boots, hands behind his back, gently rocking back and forth. Only the bite of the wind through thickets of scrub and spindly hawthorns broke the eerie silence. Wickham Fen was a desolate place, empty and sullen.

Then, suddenly, the caw of a crow and a low whistle. The boy appeared down the slope covered in frosted twigs and grasses. He had tracked the old man. Hatton was sure of it.

The boy mumbled something to Adams who in turn beckoned to the Professor.

‘It appears we have the breedling in his little winter’s nest. Mr Feltwell here has tracked him, helped by a little smoke which is rising from his hut. The men can stay here till I give the call, for this Mucker fellow is afraid of the law, and will be off like a frightened rabbit if we don’t step softly. Professor Hatton, you seem to me to have an uncommonly light touch and an enquiring nature, so I suggest you come with me.’

Up and down banks of snow, the two men followed the child, until they reached a huge, expansive lake, edged by a tangle of rushes, frosted and hanging bent in the cold. The lake looked treacherous. The boy lay on his belly and gestured at the ice. Then slipping along, he pushed his body skidding across it. There was little choice and they followed. But as he glided, Hatton heard the sound of cracking, and was sure he felt the water and the lake dragging him down, but no, the boy was right. The ice held solid. Hatton’s hands were tingling, but the sight of the curling smoke ahead made him forget his lack of comfort. The child had not failed them.

The old man’s hut was a tumble dwelling made of muck and bits of old wood. No windows, just a hole in the roof for the smoke to escape, and for a door, a mouldy, mildewed cutting of spruce wood. Outside the hut was a collection of tools and frozen fish heads. Bits of old leather hung over branches in the surrounding trees. With no window to look through, Adams knocked on the door.

‘Who goes there?’ asked a rough voice from inside.

‘It’s Bob Feltwell, Mucker. I’ve men here that will give you money.’

Adams glowered at the boy, but the child paid no heed and pulled the wood flap back on its hinge.

Inside the hut it was dark, airless, womb-like. In the centre, a small fire was lit, heating an ancient black cooking pot on a big metal chain. Something was bubbling away, something rotten. Just a hint of tanning in the air. Hatton had seen the fish leather outside, left hanging over the sedge, like forlorn oily flags.

And curled up tight, in a ball, was the breedling. At first, he was hard to make out. His feet were swaddled in reed, his body tangled up in a torn cape of strange leather, slimy and badly done. As Hatton’s eyes adjusted in the dingy light, the Mucker’s face formed. No beard but rough, caked stubble full of twigs, dirt, and grass. His eyes, fishlike.

‘What d’ya want? Speak now,’ the voice was scratching. Then, without even moving, he spat on the floor.

‘What do’ya want with old Mucker? Speak, why don’t you?’ The breedling slowly sat up and looked at the door. Adams sensed the escape and held back, using his full height to block the only exit. The Mucker fell back on his bed.

The boy spoke up, ‘These men want information. They will pay a handsome price. There’s a man gone missing. I told them you are the best of trackers and that maybe you can help them.’

‘Help them? I had someone once. She went missing. None helped me, though I begged them. Men like you came, said they’d do something, but they did nothing. Missing, you say?’

‘Yes, Mucker. I told them about your daughter. But look at the state of yourself. You could do with a pouch of baccy, couldn’t you?’ The child was clever.

‘Money, eh? There’s money says I know nothing.’

The Inspector took a step forward. ‘The boy’s right, there’s money if you help us. And if you don’t, well, let’s just say I’ve heard there’s been a fair lot of fish being poached on Mr Wade’s land and there’s plenty of fish skins hanging out to dry on those hawthorns. They look like trout to me; not the sort of fish you’d get here in Wickham.’ Adams lit a cigarette and billowed out the smoke as he spoke.

‘You the boss, eh? The jailer? I’m not afeared of your threats. You have nothing on me. I keeps myself to myself and those skins are pikes. Just look at their size. There’s no trout rustling in December. You think I’m a fool, don’t you? Well, I’ll tell you Mr Jailor Man, I’m ancient, I’ll grant you that, but I’m not afeared of your type. You wants old Mucker’s help, well, I’ll give it but not with these threats. Money is the speaker here. As I bet it is with you. I know your sort, sir.’ The ‘sir’ was said with a snarl, and though this breedling was cornered, Hatton could sense even Adams was wary.

‘Well, given that we understand each other so well, what can you tell us and how much will it cost? Mind you, any jiggery pokery and we’ll pay you nothing.’

The boy laughed to hear Adams’s retort. And the breedling scratched his damp, matted head. Lice, Hatton didn’t wonder. He was probably crawling with them.

‘There was a strange gathering of birds up yonder on Barnet’s Mound, maybe a month ago. Like there was food to be had. I did think it strange at the time, for its winter and not feasting time for crows. They had gathered up there like it was autumn on sowing ground. Hovering, cawing, and flocking about in a round. Maybe you’d best look up there.’

‘Can you take us?’ asked Adams.

‘Take the boy. You know the mound, boy, don’t you? I’ve been out all night tracking badgers.’

The urchin nodded yes. But Adams remained tight-lipped and continued, threatening, ‘Badgers? A likely tale. What if I told you that a man has been murdered? That this man has been flayed and skinned. That some devil has stuffed him like one of your pikes. What would you say to that, stodger? Would you know anyone who could do that to an innocent man, rise in the morning, and go about his work not flinching or praying for God’s mercy?’

The breedling stirred in his bed. ‘God’s mercy? What’s that? I know no mercy in my life. There’s no God’s mercy for my kith and kin. It’s just the rich that’s served. Stuffed, you say? That would be a job. To tan and stuff a man. I’ve heard that there are those that will do anything. But I just do fish. Nothing fancy. My tools are over there. You can check if you like. Try the rich taxidermists in Cambridge – they’re the artists. How was he done? Fancy like or plain? Was he in a cabinet or sat down for tea? That’s what they do, those charlatan stuffers. They dress owls up as schoolmasters and rabbits as maids. I see nature for what it is. I stuff little things. Not a man.’ His voice faltered as he shrunk back.

‘Just look on the mound. I know nothing more. You’ll leave me the money, won’t you?’ Adams looked in his purse and pulled out a shilling. Even he seemed moved by this pitiful creature.

‘If this money’s for nought, I’ll be back old man.’ Adams stubbed his cigarette out on the floor.

Back across the ice, and up the bank, Adams blew his whistle and in a minute the Specials arrived. ‘Let the boy lead, come on.’

‘This is it,’ said Feltwell. ‘This is the mound.’

It was hardly a mound, but a smallish rise, barely six feet long and five feet wide. But it stood out against the unrelentingly flat horizon, which stretched for mile upon dreary mile. There were no crows fluttering or otherwise, only a solitary bird cawing plaintively across the Fens from a frozen ash tree. Adams shrugged. ‘Well, it’s as good a place as any, I suppose, and it’s not unlike a grave.’

He gave the command, ‘Right boys, start digging.’

And it wasn’t long before, bit by bit, Dr Finch came up. Some chunks, raw and meaty, frozen like lamb. Other bits wrapped in flax. The local boys worked hard and brought up the pieces with iron-like bellies, though some of the Specials had to stop and billow up their breakfasts. Adams all the time stood grimly puffing on his cigarettes. ‘Well, Professor, peat is the perfect preserver. Whoever buried him here needs some geology lessons if they thought he was gone.’

‘Over here! Quick!’

A short man with a shovel in his hand stood over a hole. Hatton took a step back, although he’d seen a hundred like this, taking students through their rudimentary lessons. They often spent time on the head at St Bart’s, which the dieners skinned neatly, leaving the brain exposed so the student dissectors could pick, bit by bit, to the core.

And yet in that moment, as Hatton recovered briefly from his own shock at this morbid discovery, he wondered why it was that the head should cause him to flinch more than a muscle? Or a thigh? Or even a heart? Perhaps, Hatton thought, this is where a man’s soul lies? All thinking, feelings, ideas. All love, desire, passion. Everything that makes Man human. But Finch had been made featureless. Just a bloody ball of flesh and skull, now.

‘Go back to Ely with the Feltwell boy and tell him to shut his mouth about this sight. Pay him more if we need to. There’ll be a hundred gawpers here if we don’t move quickly. I need wire and boards to fence this lot off.’ Adams seemed unfazed. ‘Professor Hatton, I’m going back to see our breedling friend. A guinea says he knows more.’

Hatton watched the men shovelling deep into the ground. He shivered as the men worked, digging and crunching their blades through the peaty snow. The wind whipped up with flurries of snow. Was this God’s work? Was it fate? Ant-like, the men continued, black shadows in the failing light, the sun dipping palest yellow. And the snow fell.

At The Eagle, Broderig was playing chess by himself. But on their entrance, he stood up, putting his hand out to greet them saying, ‘Can I buy you both a drink, gentlemen?’

‘We’ll have two pints, Mr Broderig,’ replied the Inspector. ‘And chasers to follow. It’s been a long day.’

‘You found him, then?’

Hatton nodded. ‘The meat and the organs have been preserved. They will easily survive the train journey back to London. I have asked Inspector Adams to put Finch, in his entirety, on the first train tomorrow. We’re going to be busy at St Bart’s.’

Broderig pulled out a chair for Hatton and said, ‘My understanding is limited, but I could make myself useful at the morgue. It’s better than doing nothing.’

Hatton was touched by a genuine offer. But he shook his head. ‘No, but thank you, Mr Broderig. We’ll cope, but it will be time-consuming, exacting work. Finch’s body parts have been severed into many pieces but each chunk may offer us a clue. But I think he was the first and I believe the others, Lady Bessingham, Mr Dodds, followed on. The timing of the deaths, I would suggest, spaced out over the last ten days or so. Maybe longer. So extreme violence precipitated by something which connects them. But as to what? I cannot say. Any ideas, gentlemen?’

But Broderig just stared at his hands while Adams knocked back an ale, followed by the chaser, followed by three more, called for in quick succession. His voice slurring, he said, ‘It’s all a question of motive. Who would want these botanicals dead? Who has something to gain by this? I had a message from London. Our missing maid had been to the British Museum, it seems. A footman remembered, after an intimate chat with one of my Specials. But who she was meeting there, he couldn’t or wouldn’t say. An academic was all he would offer. So that hardly narrows it down. But at least it’s a lead. Anyway, gentlemen.’ The Inspector put his glass down, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and said, ‘Early start tomorrow. And I’m badly in need of some shut-eye, so goodnight, then.’

Leaving Hatton thinking he ought to do the same. But something about Broderig’s face made him hesitate. ‘Are you quite well, Mr Broderig?’