Mrs. Jeffries Stands Corrected (21 page)

“Excellent.” Witherspoon hoped his policeman’s instinct wasn’t leading him astray. “Please try and make sure that no one, especially the press, knows exactly where her body was found.”

Barnes gently rolled the late Ellen Hoxton onto her back. He got to his feet, shaking his head. “But what difference does it make if people know where she was found? Whoever killed her probably thinks she’s halfway to Gravesend by now.”

“That’s precisely my point, Constable,” Witherspoon said briskly. “And we want the killer to go right on thinking that.”

James McNally dropped his hand from Betsy’s mouth and leapt back. “Oh dear, dear,” he wailed in a high-pitched voice. “Why are you following me? What do you want? Please don’t scream. Did my father put you up to this?”

Stunned, Betsy stared at him. “Your father?”

“It would be just like him to hire a woman to spy on me,” McNally said shrilly. “It wouldn’t be the first time. Are you another of those typewriter girls?” He took a step closer to her. “He tried to foist one on me before. The minx showed up bold as brass at my office last week. She was carrying that silly little machine and she told me she’d been hired to do my correspondence. But I took care of her; I wasn’t going to have her clattering away on that thing, watching my every move, seeing who came and went in my office and then running and tattling to my father. I poured treacle on the wretched thing.”

“You poured treacle on a typewriter girl?” Betsy repeated. She couldn’t believe her ears! James McNally was mad. Absolutely, stark raving mad. And she was alone here on a deserted dock with him.

“Not on the girl, on her stupid typewriter,” he explained
belligerently. “She took herself right off, she did. Ran screaming down the hall and out into the street. She wasn’t there to take care of my correspondence.”

“How do you know?” Betsy thought perhaps it would be best to keep him talking. At least until someone else came along or she could think of a way to get out of here.

“Because I don’t have any correspondence,” he said, his eyes gleaming triumphantly. “I haven’t had a case in six months. My father’s always complaining about that too. It’s not my fault I’ve no clients. It’s his. If he’d only leave me alone, I’m sure I could do nicely.” He angled toward her. “He hired you, didn’t he?”

“No, of course not.” Betsy drew back and cast a quick glance around the area. The dock was still empty. There weren’t even any boats out on the river. Not that she could swim. “I don’t even know who you are.”

He glared at her suspiciously. “Then why were you following me? Don’t try and deny it. You’ve been walking behind me for the last twenty minutes.”

“I wasn’t following you,” she insisted. “I was just takin’ a walk and minding my own business when you grabbed me.” She shot a quick look toward the end of the passageway. No help there.

“In this neighborhood?” He laughed. But the sound was harsh and ugly and made her stomach churn in fear. “I’m not stupid, you know. There’s nothing here but a deserted dock. No one in their right mind goes walking in this area, even in broad daylight.”

“You did.” Betsy edged back a bit. If she had to, she’d make a run for the passageway. He might not catch her before she made it out to the street.

“I’ve business here,” he snapped. “How much is he paying you?”

It didn’t take too much thinking to know what he was
on about. “He’s not payin’ me nothin’,” she yelled, hoping that by screaming at the man she’d attract some attention. She was getting tired of this and a little angry too. “Now leave off botherin’ me and I’ll be on my way.”

She started to turn and he grabbed her arm. “You’re not going anywhere until you admit he’s paying you to spy on me.”

“Let me go.”

“Not until you tell me.”

Betsy saw red. It would be a cold day in the pits of Hades before she’d put up with being handled like this. Instinctively, she made a fist of her right hand, using a method she’d been taught by some pretty tough ladies when she was a girl living in the East End. Before McNally realized what she was doing, she drew her right arm all the way back, shot it forward and smacked him right on the jaw.

“Ow…” He dropped her arm and leapt backward. He stumbled and fell, landing hard on his backside. “That hurt.”

Betsy turned and started to run. She’d almost made it to the passageway when she realized he wasn’t coming after her. She threw a quick look over her shoulder and then stopped dead.

James McNally was sitting on the dock, crying his eyes out.

“Are you absolutely certain?” Witherspoon asked. He and Constable Barnes were standing on the door stoop of a rundown lodging house near the East India Docks.

Molly, the barmaid from the Gilded Lily, shook her head. “’Corse I’m sure. I saw her with me own eyes. I even told Mick about it. Not that the silly sod was payin’ attention; he never paid attention when I said something.”

“But Mick told us she left a note for Mr. Dapeers,”
Witherspoon persisted. He needed to get this right. He needed to make himself perfectly clear so that Molly understood exactly what he was asking.

Molly waved her hands impatiently. “I give Mr. Dapeers the note she left. But she come back later that afternoon.”

“But Mick didn’t mention that.”

“Mick was too busy jawin’ with the workman out in the back to notice. But she waltzed in big as you please and went right into the saloon bar with Mr. Dapeers. They talked for a good ten minutes and then she left.” Molly looked pointedly at the street. “I’ve got to be goin’, Inspector. I’ve got to take the rest of them linens from the Lily over to the laundry. Then I’ve got to get to work.”

Witherspoon and Barnes both stepped out of her way as she pushed past them and started down the short path to the street. “You have a new position?” he asked politely.

Molly nodded and continued moving steadily toward the road. “At the White Hart over on Cory Place,” she yelled. “It’s not much of a pub, but the pay is decent. Better than what Dapeers was payin’ me anyway.”

“You didn’t happen to overhear what they were talking about, did you?” Witherspoon scrambled after the woman. He didn’t want to order her to stay put long enough to finish answering his questions. He knew how difficult employment was to come by for women of her age.

Molly stopped, turned and glared at him, offended by his question. “I don’t eavesdrop on people.”

“I didn’t mean to imply you did,” he said quickly. “I do apologize. But occasionally, one does overhear things. Why, it happens to me all the time.”

She gazed at him suspiciously for a moment and then her expression cleared. “All right, I guess you’re only tryin’ to do yer job. I didn’t hear what they was talkin’ about, I was busy gettin’ ready for the openin’. But I did
see Mr. Dapeers give her a fiver.” She started toward the street again.

“A fiver?” Witherspoon rushed after her. “You mean he gave her five pounds?”

She turned onto the road. “That’s what a fiver is.”

“And you didn’t think it important to tell us this before?”

She shrugged and started to cross the road. “I thought he was just buyin’ himself a bit o’ fun, if you know what I mean. She were known to do that every now and again.” Molly laughed at her own wit. “And he did it all the time. Gossip had it that he’d even tried to tumble his sister-in-law.”

“Ruddy men, they don’t listen to a word you say,” Molly grumbled. “I’m not even sure that police inspector knows how to listen properly. But you’re not like them, are ya, lad?”

Wiggins smiled at the woman and heaved the heavy wicker basket he’d just taken from her to his other hip. “Well,” he replied doubtfully, “I do the best I can. ’Ow far is it to the laundry?”

“Not far.” Molly pointed up toward the end of Bonham Road. “It’s just round the corner and then a bit. It’s right nice of ya to carry that for me. Bloomin’ ’eavy, it is.”

“Don’t like to see a lady such as yerself carryin’ such a load,” he said gallantly. He’d hung around the neighborhood of the Gilded Lily all morning. When he’d spotted Molly coming out the back door carrying a large basket, he’d leapt at the chance to do his good deed for the day. “What was you sayin’ about the coppers?”

“Oh them.” She waved her hands in dismissal. “They come around askin’ more questions today. It’s not
like I ’adn’t talked to ’em before, you know. Not my fault that no one ever listens.”

“I guess they was askin’ about the murder.” Wiggins slowed his steps. The basket was heavy, but he didn’t want to arrive at the laundry before he found
something
out.

“’Corse they was askin’ about the murder,” Molly grumbled. “Don’t know why they’re tryin’ so hard to find the killer. Seems to me the guilty one is right under their nose. Not that I blame ’er, mind you. If my old man had brought ’ome what Haydon Dapeers did, I’d probably shoved a knife in his back too.”

“You think Mrs. Dapeers is the murderer?” Wiggins asked incredulously.

“’Corse I do.” Molly snorted in disgust. “My daughter works as a housemaid for Dapeers. She only started a month ago and she was goin’ to try and find something else. But then he up and got himself murdered, so Agatha decided to stay on. She likes Mrs. Dapeers. Agatha’s heard plenty in that house. Not that the police have bothered talking to her, oh no, I guess they don’t think a servant’s got ears. But Agatha told me plenty.”

Wiggins decided trying to worm information out of this woman was a waste of time. He could tell by the eager gleam in her eyes that she was dying to tell everything she knew. “What’d she say?”

“Well, I’m not one to be repeatin’ gossip,” Molly said with relish. “But Agatha overheard the most awful row a few days before Mr. Dapeers was murdered.”

“What was it about?”

Molly gazed at him speculatively. “Well, I don’t think I ought to say, it’s not very nice to talk about. Especially to one so young.”

“I’m older than I look.” He shifted the heavy basket to
his other side. “Besides, it wouldn’t be fair to stop now. I’ll die of curiosity.”

“I know what you mean, lad. I hate it when people do that. Well, as I was sayin’, last week Agatha was cleaning out the closet in the bedroom next to Mrs. Dapeers’s room. All of a sudden she heard Mrs. Dapeers screamin’ at Mr. Dapeers that he was a depraved animal. Well, it frightened Agatha no end, it did. But she was like you, curious. So she leaned her ear against the wall and you’ll never guess what she heard.”

“What?”

“Mrs. Dapeers had found out that Mr. Dapeers had caught the shanker!” Molly shook her head, her expression disgusted. “If my old man brought somethin’ like that home, I’d do ’im in, I would. I expect that’s exactly what Mrs. Dapeers did.”

Wiggins wasn’t sure if he knew what a “shanker” was. But he didn’t really want to ask. He decided he’d wait till tonight and ask Smythe. He’d know. And he wouldn’t laugh at him for askin’, either.