The Silk Thief (9 page)

‘And did you?’ Leo asked.

‘What a rude question,’ Friday said, much more at ease now she’d steered the conversation away from the dangerous truth.

Leo waggled Bella’s letter.

‘No, I did not, though I felt like it. She was a right bitch, Liz.’

‘Then who did?’

‘Bella did it herself.’

Leo handed Friday the letter and leant on the windowsill, looking down on the traffic passing on Argyle Street, to give her some privacy.

She broke the seals and read what Bella had written, not knowing what to think at all, it was that unexpected. ‘Thank Christ for that,’ she said eventually.

Leo asked, ‘Good news?’

There was no point to hiding this part of it from him any longer. ‘She sent Harrie a note yesterday. Well, some scruffy little guttersnipes dropped it in her basket at the markets. She was demanding four hundred quid —
double
what she’d told us to give Furniss last Sunday.’

‘The night he died?’

Friday nodded.

‘And did you deliver the money?’

‘I tried but Walter took it back off Furniss’s body.’

‘Did you see what happened?’

‘No, I’d gone by then. To the pub.’

Leo rubbed at his beard. ‘Four hundred. That’s steep. Can you pay?’

‘Don’t have to.’ Friday waved Bella’s letter. ‘She says here she accepts we didn’t top Furniss. She probably knew what the bastard was doing to poor little Walter all those months on the ship. She only wants the original amount. But she wants it this Friday night.’

‘And that was two hundred?’ Leo whistled. ‘It’s still a fortune. How will you pay it?’ Then he realised they already had paid it once. ‘How the hell did you get hold of that sort of money?’

‘We save it. I make a lot here, and Adam pays Sarah a good wage, and Harrie, well, Harrie pays what she can. She puts in everything you pay her for the flash, you know, except for a bit she sends home every month. Anyway, she doesn’t have to pay much. Me and Sarah owe her.’

‘What for?’

‘She kept us all together for the first eighteen months after we met. We wouldn’t have managed if it hadn’t been for Harrie.’

‘And now she’s falling apart.’

‘You’ve noticed.’

‘Aye, I have. It’s a worry.’

Friday tucked the letter into the top of her corset and stood.

‘Would you have paid four hundred?’ Leo asked, moving towards the door.

‘If we’d had to.’

‘Christ, lass, how would you have raised that sort of money in a hurry?’

‘We already had the two hundred, and a bit more. We’d have had to borrow the rest.’

Leo opened the door. ‘I could have helped there. I’ve a bit put away.’

‘You mightn’t have got it back for a while,’ Friday said as she crossed the landing, her robe floating behind her and her riotous copper hair fanning out across her back. ‘There’s other things we need to pay for, as well.’

‘Such as?’ Leo eyed her shapely calves.

Friday stopped and turned towards him. ‘A mate in the Factory. Janie’s raising our friend Rachel’s child, Charlotte, together with her own little girl, Rosie. They depend on us. And we won’t be letting them down, no matter what.’ She hesitated, then said, ‘You asked before why Lou would spy on me. Because she’s working for Bella, that’s why. I’m bloody well sure of
that
, too.’

Chapter Four

The wall on Kent Street surrounding the old Sydney burial ground was six feet high, but did little to contain the stench seeping from the sour clay behind it. Not even the sharp chill of the winter night could stifle the smell.

‘Bloody hell,’ Sarah said, adjusting the woollen scarf over her mouth and nose. The place always stank, especially during summer, but during daylight hours you could rush past, holding your breath, without the risk of turning an ankle on the rough street surface. Only those with absolutely no sense of smell — or who had nefarious intent, as it was rumoured to be a meeting place for rogues, footpads and other lowlifes — deliberately loitered in the burial ground’s vicinity.

‘It’s worse inside,’ Friday remarked. She raised her lantern. ‘Are you all right?’ she asked Harrie.

Harrie nodded, her nose hovering an inch above a posy of lavender and daphne. She wasn’t all right, though. She felt sick with nerves. What if Bella herself turned up to collect the money? She was terrified of coming face to face with her. And why here again? Furniss had been killed here, so surely the police would be on the alert, but Sarah said it was smart of Bella — folk would be giving the burial ground a wide berth, wary of being attacked themselves by a murderer not yet apprehended.

Harrie wished Leo was hiding in the shadows, watching out for them, but he wasn’t. This was their business, not his. She’d felt ashamed when Friday had told her and Sarah that Leo also knew about Bella’s blackmail now — Lord, Sarah had been angry! — because she’d never wanted to lie to Leo, about anything, but Friday had fed him the version of the story involving Liz Parker, so at least he didn’t know what a horribly wicked person she was. He’d hate her, if he did. True, he hadn’t hated Walter for what he’d done, but Walter was a child and he’d been very badly mistreated. She was a grown woman of almost twenty and had no excuse for her sins. No excuse at all.

She was glad she’d come tonight, even though she had the jitters and her knees were wobbly and she badly wanted to sit down but there was nothing to sit on. She was even a little bit proud of herself. When Sarah had told Friday she would come with her to the burial ground, Harrie had been dismayed because she’d known she’d have to volunteer, too. But she’d realised that if she could summon the guts to do that, then perhaps she wasn’t as useless and as powerless as she felt. And the more she thought about it, the more the idea became a small victory, for her anyway, even if they were handing over their hard-earned money to a nasty, blackmailing bitch. So here she was, vaguely triumphant, dizzy and wanting to be sick.

Stamping her feet against the cold, Friday said, ‘She might send Brainless Becky and Lumpy Louisa.’

‘Would she trust them?’ Sarah asked.

‘She trusted Furniss.’

‘She knew she could hunt him down, you mean.’

‘Then she can definitely hunt down Becky and Louisa. Pair of lardarsed hedgewhores.’

The gate in the wall opened with a discordant creak; Harrie, Sarah and Friday all jumped. A woman stepped through. She wore a shawl draped over her head and across her nose and face, revealing only her eyes. Obviously not Bella, however — this woman was too short and more rounded in the body.

‘Money,’ she said in a muffled voice, extending her hand.

The movement of her clothing sent out a waft of tuberose, powerful enough to compete with the stink seeping from the burial ground, and Friday was struck by a terrible suspicion. She’d know that cheap scent anywhere. She lifted her lantern.

‘It’s you! It bloody is!’

The woman’s eyes widened in alarm, and as she took a rapid step sideways her shawl slid back from her forehead an inch or so, revealing dark, gleaming hair.

Friday exploded. ‘Lou, you fucking bitch! I bloody knew it was you!’

Lou whipped out a knife, its blade glinting in the lantern light, and demanded, ‘Give me the money!’

Sarah withdrew the pouch containing the two hundred pounds from an inside pocket of her cloak. As she stepped forwards, Lou made a jerky lunge towards her, slashing wildly. Horrified, Harrie could see that Sarah was about to walk directly into the upward arc of the swinging knife, and shoved her out of the way.

Lou missed Sarah altogether and as her momentum carried her past, Friday tore her shawl off her head with one hand, and punched her in the jaw with the other.

But it wasn’t Lou.

It was Rowie Harris.

Stunned, Friday gaped at her.

‘Stop staring, you gulpy cow,’ Rowie spat. She rubbed her jaw, then snatched the pouch out of Sarah’s unresisting hand and backed away. ‘What did you expect? You think you’re so special, don’t you, with your precious little crew no one else can join? But you’re not. None of you. You’re no better than the rest of us. Convict slags, the lot of you!’

She ran off down the street, then skidded to a halt and called out, ‘And you, Harrie holier-than-bloody-thou Clarke, I’ve been having the loveliest time fucking your James Downey. He’ll never want you now.’

As Dr James Downey tied his black silk cravat in a simple Gordian knot — there’d be no ridiculous, neck-contorting sartorial arrangements such as ‘the Mathematical’ or ‘the Mailcoach’ for him — he realised what was missing; no tantalising smell of cooking eggs and toasting bread. And now that he thought about it, he hadn’t heard the usual sounds of Rowie banging pots around this morning either. Uncharacteristically, she’d taken Friday evening, Saturday and Sunday off, to visit a friend, she’d said, but had assured him she’d be back late last night, in time to see him off to work this morning. Perhaps she’d slept in, which would be unheard of.

He opened his bedroom door and peered out: the parlour was as empty as it had been when he’d retired last night. And the fire was cold. How inconvenient. He had to be at the surgery in half an hour.

It occurred to him then that Rowie might be ill. He’d reluctantly agreed to take her on — in fact had been coerced into it by his partner, Dr Lawrence Chandler — due to menstrual complaints preventing her from working as a prostitute for Elizabeth Hislop. Perhaps she was suffering a severe relapse and was unable to drag herself out of bed.

He went outside — the only way to reach Rowie’s accommodation adjoining the house — and knocked on her door. There was no answer. He waited a moment, knocked again, then cautiously entered. He hadn’t been inside Rowie’s room since she’d moved in, but he was fairly confident it didn’t normally look like this. There was nothing on any of the surfaces, the clothes rail across one corner was bare, and the bureau drawers sagged open, empty. She appeared to have gone, taking all her things with her.

Why? He’d thought she’d seemed happy here. He closed the door and returned to the house to make himself some breakfast. After an unsatisfactory meal of rubbery fried eggs and burnt toast, he left his dishes, cutlery and the greasy cast-iron frying pan in a basin of cold water to soak, and shrugged into his coat. He was puzzled. Should he look for Rowie? But where would he start? Perhaps she’d met a man and run off with him. If that was the case, good luck to her. There had never been anything intimate between them, but now that he’d become accustomed to someone cooking his meals, attending to his domestic chores and generally cleaning up after him — an arrangement he’d resisted for some time due to his fear of gossip — he’d decided he quite liked it. Surely it wouldn’t be that hard to find another housegirl. A wife, of course, would be infinitely preferable, but there was only one woman he was interested in marrying, and Harrie was turning into rather a long-term project. But that was all right. He was prepared to wait for her.

He settled his hat on his head, picked up his bag and stepped outside into the cool morning air, locking the door behind him. Damn, he’d have to find someone to tend the garden now, too. Rowie had looked after that as well. Strolling down the gravel path, to his delight he suddenly noticed Harrie standing on the street, the brim of her bonnet framing her pretty little face and a woollen shawl tucked around her trim figure. Actually, she was looking a little too trim these days, in his opinion.

‘Harrie! What are you doing out this early?’

By way of an answer she raised her bare hand and slapped him hard across his face.

‘Ow!’ His hand flew to his stinging cheek. ‘What was that for?’

‘You know,’ she said bitterly. ‘How could you?’

‘How could I what?’

But it was too late: Harrie was off down the street, her skirts flashing and her bonnet slipping, only the ribbons saving it from flying off.

‘Harrie? Harrie!’ Part of him desperately wanted to go after her, to stop her and find out what was wrong, but then the stuffy, straitlaced and proper side of him — the ex-navy captain and genteel doctor with a public practice — told him much more forcefully that upstanding gentlemen did not chase women down the street.

So he watched helplessly as Harrie ran away from him.

Harrie didn’t know how long she’d been wandering around. She’d come out early on the pretence of buying bread for the Barretts’ breakfast, but her intention had definitely been to confront James before he left for the surgery. She’d agonised since Friday night about the foul gob of poison Rowie had spat out at the burial ground, and while her common sense — and Friday and Sarah — had told her the revelation had been nothing more than a barb of pure nastiness, her heart had believed Rowie. And it still did. The voices in her head had been right after all. She had confronted James, but she’d barely said to him anything she’d wanted to say. The depth of his betrayal had rendered her virtually speechless. She felt even worse now, and she hadn’t achieved anything.

She had so wanted him to be different. She’d so wanted him to be decent. She’d thought he was.

And she’d been wrong.

But this is what happened when you did the sort of things she’d done. This is what happened when you sinned. You paid.

The streets were busy now. It must be nearly mid-morning. Nora Barrett would be very angry with her when she got back, and quite rightly so. She’d not been there to make breakfast, Samuel and Hannah had been due for baths this morning, and Abigail had wanted help with casting on the first row of a scarf she was knitting. She’d let them down. Blinking back tears, she crossed the street and headed north towards home.

Outside the bakery near the corner of George and Jamison streets, the one that sold the moist pound cake and the good, crisp ginger biscuits, she came across a small boy sitting on the edge of the footway, his bare feet in the muddy gutter. Seeing his tear-stained little face and snotty upper lip, and already feeling distraught and terribly on edge, Harrie couldn’t help weeping herself.

She crouched beside him. ‘Where’s your ma?’

The boy looked at her and cried even harder. So did Harrie. She retrieved her handkerchief, blew her nose, folded it over to find a clean bit and wiped his top lip, and tried again.