Summon Up the Blood (27 page)

At least there was no Queer Killer, or any mention of vampires, alliterative or otherwise.

As ever, the front page of the
Illustrated Police News
was given over to a pictorial representation of the salient points. The four bodies were shown in situ, in separate vignettes arranged around a silhouetted figure, presumably intended to be the murderer. The artist – on what basis, Quinn could not imagine – appeared to have given this shadowy phantom an opera cape and top hat. Quinn focused on the featureless black shape, willing an identifiable presence to step forward and reveal itself. He could not dispel the notion that the figure possessed the vague animalistic head of the Egyptian deity Set, its strange upright ears hidden beneath the top hat.

Naturally, in all papers, the police were portrayed as being utterly out of their depth. The usual appeal for members of the public who might have seen anything suspicious to come forward was held to be an admission of failure.

He could imagine how Sir Edward would receive all this. The ‘moral panic’ that he had wished to avoid was clearly under way. Well, it couldn’t be helped. The important thing now was to press on with the case and find the murderer quickly before there were any more victims.

At Quinn’s request, detectives from the City Police were making enquiries at the London Central Telegraph Office on St Martin’s-le-Grand in order to confirm Bittlestone’s identification of one of the victims as Eric Sealey, and to investigate the possibility that the other victims had some connection with the place. He was expecting their findings at any moment. Meanwhile, Macadam was in the East End pursuing his lead concerning the rope fibres. It was frustrating, to say the least, that Inchball had so far failed to report for duty this morning. Quinn was impatient to hear what he had discovered at the house on Adelaide Road. He could only think that his enquiries had resulted in another lead, which he had taken it upon himself to follow up.

Quinn turned the pages of the
Clarion
away from its typical – and galling – subheading:
QUICK-FIRE QUINN IN A QUANDARY.

His eye at last settled on a photograph in the society pages. He was drawn to it because he recognized one of the people in it as Harry Lennox. With him was a young woman with a compelling face, though whether the quality that compelled was beauty or cruelty he could not say. She was identified in the caption as Lennox’s daughter, Jane.

The third figure in the photograph was a man whose age seemed to be between that of Lennox and his daughter, though arguably closer to the former. Quinn struggled to think where he had seen this man before. According to the caption, he was Lord Tobias Marjoribanks, ‘once a noted society artist, who last year returned to these shores after a long residency in the United States of America’. Quinn thought that that ‘once’ must have hurt. However, his expression showed no sign of disappointment or rancour. If anything, he seemed rather pleased with himself. And so, if he had suffered the loss of an artistic career, the impression was that he had gained something far more valuable. Precisely what that something was, Quinn discovered when he read the short paragraph that accompanied the photograph: ‘Marjoribanks had recently become engaged to Jane Lennox’. Quinn was not surprised. Despite the disparity in their ages, they looked made for one another.

Both Lennox and Marjoribanks were dressed in the type of attire that the
Illustrated Police News
artist had chosen for the mysterious perpetrator. But this was not an interesting coincidence in any way, because it was the standard evening wear of the well-to-do or aristocratic male about town. What was strange, however, was how differently the garb sat on each man. On Lennox, despite his undoubted confidence and ease, for which Quinn could personally attest, the outfit appeared awkward, as if it were a costume he had hired for the occasion hurriedly, without trying on first. Quinn had the impression that not only Lennox, but everyone, would be more comfortable if he wore tweeds. Lord Marjoribanks, on the other hand, carried off the formal attire as one who had been born to it.

Quinn folded away the newspapers and spread out a street map of London. Using a red pencil, he marked with an X the locations at which the bodies had been found. The statements and police reports he had read indicated that, as with the first murder, the victims had been killed elsewhere and placed where they were discovered. The killer must have access to an efficient mode of transportation – a motor car, for example. That suggested the murderer was either wealthy enough to own a car, or someone whose job it was to drive a vehicle, whether motor-powered or horse-drawn. Quinn had always thought that driving a taxi would be the perfect occupation for a murderer. Given the multiplicity of victims, a delivery driver was also a possibility. Quinn tried to picture the three bodies piled in the back of an unknown van, thrown together in a posthumous intimacy.

Unless one assumed the presence of an accomplice, the killer must have driven himself and his dead passengers about. An accomplice could not be ruled out, but for the time being Quinn proceeded on the basis that the killer was acting alone. It was far more likely, given the particularly horrendous and shameful aspect of the crimes. That said, he knew of cases where men had come together to conspire in the commission of the most dreadful acts.

It was not known in what order the last three victims had been killed. According to Dr Yelland, their deaths occurred at approximately the same time. Quinn imagined an orgy of destruction. The killer must have picked the three youths up together. Perhaps they had even been complicit in each other’s murder. Two held the first one down while his throat was slit. Then one was persuaded to turn on his mate. The last one would be left to beg for mercy as he realized that his earlier cooperation would not save him.

It was also impossible to say in what order their bodies had been placed. However, the plotting of the marks on the map encouraged one to think of a movement from East to West. In which case, the question had to be asked:
Where next?

Quinn imagined a line drawn roughly through the locations marked. Like points on a graph, they did not align exactly. However, they held together sufficiently well to suggest a consistent direction of travel. Extending this line at its westward end, the next prominent structure upon which his eye alighted was Lincoln’s Inn. Beyond that, the line took him to the British Museum.

The former might be said to stand for the state’s judicial apparatus, the latter for its cultural heritage. If Quinn was right in his theory that the murderer was in some way engaged in an attack upon the cornerstones of the Empire, these institutions might be considered plausible targets for his attention.

Where would it end?
had to be the next question.

Quinn took a twelve-inch wooden ruler from his drawer. He laid it over the points and ran his finger along the edge, until it reached a rectangle of pale green at the north-west of the capital. The patch was labelled
Lord’s Cricket Ground
.

Macadam returned to the department around midday, carrying a coil of rope which he dropped on to Quinn’s desk. ‘A present for you, sir.’ There was an excited energy about Macadam’s eyes.

‘I take it from this that your morning has not been entirely wasted?’

Macadam smiled in acknowledgement. ‘Indeed not, sir. I made enquiries at every rope maker’s and chandler’s in the Limehouse and Poplar area. As it turned out, it was at the very first establishment I visited, Willett’s on Bridge Road, just next to the Locke’s Lead Works, that I made my discovery.’

‘Which is?’

‘Willett the chandler recalled selling a quantity of rope to a fellow whom he described as . . .’ Macadam consulted his notepad. ‘
Not the usual type we gets in ’ere
. I recorded his words verbatim, sir.’

‘Very good, Macadam. Kindly continue.’

‘When I asked him what was so very unusual about this fellow, he said that he was a toff. He went on to affirm that they do not get many toffs in there. In fact, he went so far as to say that he had never served a single toff in his life before this mysterious customer.’

‘Hardly surprising, given his store’s location in the East End.’

‘Indeed, sir. I asked if he could remember whether the rope he sold was tarred or untarred, and he averred that it was the latter. He further remarked that while he was out back fetching the rope, the toff must have lit up a cigarette. He particularly noticed it when he came back because he disliked the smell, which he said fair stank out his shop. I asked him if there was anything else he remembered about the cigarette, and he said that it was
yeller
.’ Macadam gave what Quinn assumed was an imitation of the chandler’s delivery of that word, injecting it with a forceful contempt. ‘He seemed to strongly object to the colour, but on what grounds, I could not ascertain.’

‘Sounds like it could be our man, Macadam.’

‘I took the liberty of purchasing a length of the same rope, which as you may have gathered is this here sample here. With your permission, sir, it was my intention to pass this on to my pal Charlie Cale to get him to compare it to the fibres that came from the first victim.’

‘Of course. Doctor Yelland recovered similar fibres from the other victims, which I had him send to Cale. I await his report. You could perhaps find out how he is getting on if you mean to take that rope to him. If we can link all the murders to the rope bought at your chandler’s, it would be a significant breakthrough. Especially if the chandler is able to cast light on the identity of our toff. Did he come up with a name, by any chance? A delivery address, even?’

‘Sadly, no, sir. The gentleman paid in cash and took his purchase away with him.’

‘Ah, well, it was too much to hope for, I suppose. Nonetheless, this is helping us to build up a picture. He doesn’t sound like the sort of fellow who drives a taxi or a delivery van, for instance. More like a well-to-do individual in possession of his own motor car. I have been developing the theory that the murderer must have some means of transport to convey the bodies to the various locations at which he disposes of them.’

‘I see, sir. That makes admirable sense.’

Quinn was appreciative of Macadam’s attempt to support and bolster him. However, the sergeant’s instinctive deference reminded Quinn of Inchball’s equally instinctive contrariness. ‘Where’s Inchball, do we know?’

‘I haven’t seen him since yesterday. Not since he went off to investigate James Neville’s last known address.’

At that moment, the look on Macadam’s face seemed to express exactly the icy dread that Quinn was suddenly feeling in the pit of his stomach.

T
here is a limit to how much physical pain the human body can endure. Release may come through loss of consciousness, or even death. In Inchball’s case, the intense pain of his overburdened bladder found release in the simple act of letting go. While it lasted, the deep, sweet bliss overwhelmed every other sensation or consideration. But the pleasure was short-lived. Immediately after, he was forced to lie in the pool of his own urine, his crotch and thighs chilled by his sodden trousers.

As he lay there, he thought of what he would do to Fanshaw when he caught up with him. He would make of his face a bloody pulp. He knew how much these queers valued their looks.

The clawing tightness at his throat was still with him. He felt a similar but more intense contraction in his head. It was as if his brain were being wrung dry by hands with long pointed fingernails. Some residue of the drug that had been used on him still had its hooks in him. He could feel it in the queasy gaseous sensation that had replaced his internal organs. Every so often the balloon of nausea floated up inside him, pushing the membrane of its extent against Inchball’s oesophagus.

He was forced to breathe through his nose by the cloth that had been stuffed into his mouth: a cotton handkerchief, so far as he could tell. There was no possibility of keeping his mouth moist. Any saliva he produced was immediately absorbed. Indeed, it felt as though the rag had sucked all the moisture from his body, and with it every ounce of energy.

What he needed to do more than anything was drink some water. If only he could get water to his lips, he would be capable of anything.

And so the fantasies that sustained him alternated: now he was pounding his fists into Fanshaw’s face; now he paused to gulp down a long glass of iced water, its exquisite clarity cutting through the wadding of his unbearable thirst. Each fantasy was inevitably unfulfilling. When he was let down by one, he would turn to the other. In his imagination, Fanshaw’s face repeatedly renewed itself, so that it could be destroyed afresh. In the same way, the glass was magically refilled each time he had drained it.

When both fantasies lost the capacity to distract, waves of abstract, angry emotion would break over him. Every sinew of his trussed body became tensed at the same time, as he pushed against his bonds, willing them to snap apart. But, of course, the bindings stayed in place. He would collapse, defeated by frustration and self-pity, incredulous that he had allowed himself to be bettered by a man like Fanshaw. Yes, he could only blame himself. He had let his guard down. He had let his thirst, and his partiality to tea, get the better of him.

He could not say how many times this cycle of fantasy and self-reproach repeated itself before he heard the ringing of the electric bell. The button must have become stuck again, because the shrill peal showed no sign of stopping. The ringing was drowned out by an incessant hammering, which was followed by the shout: ‘Open up! Police!’

A window shattered.

Once again, Inchball tried to initiate the muscular processes that would under any other circumstances result in a full-throated roar. But the cloth that was jammed in his mouth stifled the fierce vibration of his vocal cords. A muffled groan was all that he could produce. It didn’t matter, though; he knew that they would find him.

And indeed, just then he heard the door burst open. Hands pulled at the blindfold around his head. All at once he was looking up into Macadam’s glorious, ugly face. He felt his throat begin to convulse with emotion. He could not say whether it was laughter or sobbing that was being stifled.