The Dark Clue (52 page)

Nothing. The gate to Hand Court was shut. The pawnbroker's locked and unlighted.

More slowly, then. More slowly. Give fate time to meet you.

There was a sudden noise behind me. My heart was battering in my ears so loudly I could not tell what it was. I looked back, but there was nothing to be seen. A cat or a rat, probably, I decided, scuttling for safety.

I continued on my way. And then – unmistakably – heard footsteps hurrying after me; and, as I turned, a young, half-whispered voice:

‘You lookin' for somethin'?'

I can't be certain it was the same girl, but I think it was. She was dressed as a woman now, and her lips were reddened; but I caught the glitter of her large brown eyes, and her cheeks were still as white and unblemished as a china doll's.

‘What you after, darlin'?'

She did not seem to recognize me, but that is no surprise: the light was poor, and the intervening weeks have changed me as much as they have her. I said nothing, but held out five shillings.

She had to move and squint to see it; but when she did so, and realized how much it was, she gave a little laugh of pleasure.

‘All right,' She took the money and slipped it into a pocket. Then she moved close and put her arms round me – impetuously, inexpertly, like a child thanking her uncle for a present.

‘What's your name?'

She must have felt me stiffen and pull away; for she said:

‘What's the matter?'

I shook my head. She looked into my eyes, with a little frown of concentration, trying to see what I wanted.

‘That's all right,' she said. ‘You don't ‘ave to say nothin'.' She glanced about her, to see we were not watched, and then lifted her skirt and placed my hand against her quim, wincing despite herself at the cold touch of my fingers. Then, without speaking, she turned and led me back down the street, and through the side-entrance by the pawnbroker's into a little court, and thence into an unlit room on the ground floor.

I could see nothing; and, even if I had, I should not remember it. I remember only the Babel of voices in my head:

How can you do this?

Is she not a whore, like the other?

She is a child, and you sought her out.

There is a price for everything.

Why should she pay it?

She is as eager as I am. Having come so far, I will only distress her more if I withdraw now. And what difference will one man more or less make to her?

What difference to you?

I must be free. Is it not natural – merely one piece of flesh enfolding another? Besides, is it not what Turner did?

Is it?

I feared this ceaseless attrition would sap me, and make me incapable at the last; and so indeed it might have done, had she made any response, or reminded me, by even the faintest gesture, that we were two people, and not merely the impersonal, mechanical conjunction of complementary organs.

But she was quick to learn, and had already understood what she must do. She stood with her back to me, and bent forward, and braced herself against the wall, with barely a movement or a
murmur or a sigh. And when I was done, she guided me to the door without a word, and gently pushed me outside, locking the door behind me.

The voices were silent on my way home. I was conscious of nothing, not even the cold. Death itself had forsaken me.

Until I turned into Brompton Grove. For a moment I sensed only an animal apprehension that something was different and unexpected. Then I saw it: standing in front of the house was a black carriage. The windows were curtained, as if for a funeral. A squat coachman in a tall hat sat with his back towards me, so swaddled in blankets that he looked as improvised and immobile as a snowman. The horses themselves were invisible in the gloom, but I could see the haze of their breath on the still air.

I instantly thought of Laura – of the children – of Marian. Somehow, by my faithlessness, I had killed one of them, or made them ill. The horror of the idea stopped me dead, and I had to fight the urge to run away. But then I steadied myself. That was the voice of weakness and superstition. Dr. Hampson would have come by cab. And if someone had died, there would have been a telegram, not a carriage at the door in the middle of the night.

I started walking again, trying to convince myself that for some reason the man had simply decided to rest his horses in Brompton Grove, and that it was nothing to do with me. And had almost succeeded when, as I drew alongside, the carriage door opened abruptly in front of me, barring my path.

‘Mr. Hartright?'

It was a high, frail, man's voice that I didn't recognize. I peered into the interior, but could see nothing.

‘Mr. Hartright, get in, please. I have something to tell you.'

‘Can you not tell me out here?'

There was a small, dry sound that might equally have been a cough or a laugh.

‘I should die of the cold.' He paused, as if his supply of breath were exhausted, and must be replenished before he could continue. ‘You'll come to no harm, I promise. What could I do, even if I were minded? A brute like you would snuff me out as easily as a candle.'

I hesitated, but only for a moment. If he meant to abduct me, why did he not simply take me by force, as my previous attackers had done? And even if that were his intention, might I not still learn something of value? A few hours' loss of liberty would be a small price to pay, if it helped to end my uncertainty.

‘Very well,' I said, pulling myself up.

In the glimmer of light from the street I half-saw a bundle of rugs and wraps and muffs huddled in the corner. I should not have known it was a man, save for the eyes, which appeared for a moment in the narrow gap between fur hat and upturned collar, and immediately flickered away again. They were more shadow than substance, so sunken that they seemed to be trying to retreat inside his skull; and somehow managed to convey, in the brief instant I glimpsed them, an impression of infinite weariness.

‘Sit down, please, and close the door.'

I did so. It was now completely dark.

‘Thank you.' He had to pause again. I heard the pitiful whistle and splutter of his chest as he struggled for breath. ‘I wish to speak to you, Mr. Hartright,' he went on at last, ‘on the matter of genius. You are writing, I believe, a life of Turner?'

I did not reply, but waited for him to reveal more of his hand before I showed my own.

‘Please, Mr. Hartright,' he wheezed. ‘You must assist me. I am a sick man. Every word is a battle. I cannot afford to throw them away.'

‘Yes,' I said.

‘Very well. I was privileged to see something of him. Something, I think, you will learn from no-one else.'

‘Why?' I said. ‘Who are you?'

‘You may call me Simpson. That will do for now.'

‘It is not your real name?'

‘Why should a name I choose for myself be less real than the one given me by my parents?'

True,
I thought.
Is Jenkinson not as real as Hartright?

'That
I had to abandon a long time ago,' he continued, ‘when an indiscretion obliged me to leave England. Since then I have been living in Venice, and whenever I have returned it has always been under a
nom de voyage.'
He sucked in breath, slowly, so as
not to provoke a fit of coughing. When he spoke again, it was in a whisper.

‘Can you still hear me, Mr. Hartright?'

‘Just.'

‘It's better for me to talk like this, if that is agreeable to you. Less taxing. Shan't have to stop so often.'

‘Very well.'

‘Well, then,' he whispered. ‘You will appreciate that a man in my situation must always be careful. Make it his business to learn everything he can of his travelling companions, while giving away nothing about himself. There may be spies. Agents. Hm?'

‘Yes.'

‘Well, once I was crossing the Alps by Mount Cenis, and there was a small fellow in the carriage with me who at once roused my suspicions. Never said anything, unless someone spoke to him first, and then only brusquely. Never answered questions directly. Spent most of his time looking out of the window, and making sketches, as if he were preparing for a military campaign.'

He had to pause again. I was puzzled. Why was he going to the trouble of telling me this? Did he suppose I had not already heard countless stories of Turner's solitariness and eccentricity?

‘Well, it took me a day or two,' he went on, ‘but I found him out, little by little. The initials “J. M. W. T.” on his valise. A letter interleaved with his sketchbook. A few fragments of conversation, in which he unwittingly let slip that he knew Lord Egremont, and most of the Royal Academy.

‘We travelled together several times after that. I never said anything, of course, and he never recognized me – it would have mortified him to know that I had uncovered his secret, when he had failed to penetrate mine.'

‘Scarcely a secret,' I said. ‘At least in his case.'

His voice was so attenuated that the reply came out as no more than a kind of ghostly sigh:

‘Oh, yes! A great secret, Mr. Hartright. The secret of genius.'

My skin prickled, despite the cold.

‘I saw him often in Venice. Sometimes when he thought himself completely unobserved. And I can testify that he was a remarkable man. Peep out of your window at dawn, and there
he'd be, drawing away. Take a gondola for your evening cigar, and damn me if you wouldn't see him there still, scribbling till the last crack of the sun had gone. And then – then he needs must be away, to make sure that it rose again the next day.'

'Rose again?'

He could not reply at once. I had to clench my fists to prevent myself trying to shake the words from him. Slowly, painstakingly, he drew the air into his lungs.

‘You know what sun-worshippers are. Their god must be satisfied with blood, else he will grow angry, and return no more.'

‘Blood!'

‘I'm talking about girls, Mr. Hartright. It was common knowledge in less conventional circles. I saw them taking one out of the canal myself. There were rope marks on her wrists and ankles, a sack over her face. She'd been held under till she drowned.'

For a moment I could not speak. I could not move. Then I heard myself whispering:

‘Why are you telling me this?'

There was no answer. I waited. After perhaps fifteen seconds I felt something brush gropingly against my knee. I put my hand down and found his fingers. They were as cold as stone. The instant I touched them, they started to flutter towards my wrist.

I pulled away, and opened the door, and dropped to the ground.

I did not dream it. There is horse-shit on the ground where the carriage stood.

Can it be true?

Can it possibly be true?

Who is Simpson?

Could Kingsett have sent him?

Could it have
been
Kingsett?

LXII

Letter from Laura Hartright to Walter Hartright,
20th December, 185–

Wednesday

I dreamed last night you met a clever woman, who talked to you of all the things I cannot, and took you from me.

Dreams are often true, are they not?

Laura

LXIII

From the private notebook of Walter Hartright,
21st—22nd December, 185-

Thursday

Record. I must record.

Stamp order on the chaos.

Today I went to see a medium.

As I waited in her drawing room, I could scarce believe I found myself there. I looked down from the window at the press of people milling along Brook Street and thought how easily, even now, I might run outside again and lose myself among them.

But then the maid reappeared. ‘Mrs. Mast will see you now, sir.'

She led me into a small parlour at the rear of the house. The curtains were already drawn, and the gas-lamps lit. The fire had burned low, and there was a marked chill in the air.

Two women sat at a round table in the middle of the room. One was thin and elderly, long-faced and big-nosed, so grey and angular she might have been made out of iron. The other plump and matronly, perhaps thirty years younger, with pink cheeks and bright eyes.

‘Mr. Hartright, ma'am,' said the maid.

‘How d'ye do, Mr. Hartright?' said the younger woman, thrusting her hand out as forthrightly as a man. ‘I'm Euphemia Mast.'

‘How do you do?'

This is my mother.'

‘How do you do?'

‘She will assist me,' said Mrs. Mast. ‘Please sit down.' Her voice was brisk and businesslike, with a hard nasal American twang she made no attempt to soften. As I drew up my chair she asked:

‘Have you attended a consultation before, Mr. Hartright?'

‘Not of this kind.'

‘And why, may I ask, did you come to
me?'

‘I wish' – was I really saying it? – ‘to speak – to make contact with a dead man.'

I bit my tongue. I had resolved to disclose nothing about my purpose; for if – as I still more than half-believed – she were no more than a skilful conjuror, who had grown rich by preying on the gullible, she might well be able to construct a convincing ‘spirit' simply from what I unwittingly let slip about him. But then I relaxed a little: for, surely, to know only his sex would be a small enough advantage for even the most accomplished fraud?

‘We do not call them “dead”,' she said, as matter-of-factly as if she were an engineer correcting me for saying ‘piston' rather than ‘valve', ‘but “passed over”. Is he someone you have lost?'

‘In a manner of speaking.'

‘Well, I shall do what I can, Mr. Hartright, but I hope you understand that I can guarantee nothing. I am no more than the channel. Some spirits find it impossible to communicate from the other side. Some do not wish to.' She was suddenly grave and earnest. ‘It's most important that you realize that, before we begin.'