The Solitary House (36 page)

If that name means anything to the inscrutable Bucket, then he makes no sign.

“Very well,” says the Inspector eventually. “I will make arrangements to have you discharged. But I caution you this: You are making a mistake, my friend. A very grave mistake. I hope it does not cost you dear.”

TWENTY-TWO

A Turn of the Screw

A
ND NOW, HAVING
concealed for so long where our young hero has been, and why—more to the point—his mood has taken such a turn darkwards, it is time to rewind a little. To that conversation between Charles and the trooper and the surgeon at the shooting gallery, and the allusion to Bucket by name that seems almost to have conjured his all-too-solid appearance in the flesh. That much you know. But what you do
not
yet know, is that barely five minutes after he left the gallery, Charles was tracked down on his way back to Buckingham Street by Billy, who, out of breath and red in the face, handed him an envelope. An envelope that contained a rather formally worded letter from the chairman of the Royal Geographical Society, which eventually, after much preamble and prevarication, revealed itself to be an apology. The society had, after
‘mature reflection’
, and
‘due consideration’
, and various other carefully measured pairings of adjective and noun, finally determined that the ban laid upon him after the
‘unfortunate occurrence’
(another fine example) on the evening of the 7th inst., has now been rescinded, and he would be welcome to join them at their forthcoming meeting, at which Dr Joseph Dalton
Hooker will be discussing his
‘Fourth Excursion into the Passes of Thi-bet by the Donkiah Lah’
. The signature at the bottom was suitably ponderous, but there was a postscript underneath that seemed to have been written by the man, rather than the mouthpiece:
‘Though the manner of it was unquestionably inopportune, your intercession was nonetheless a salutary reminder that however similar things might initially appear, they are not always what they seem, and therefore it is of the utmost importance, in every branch of scientific study, to employ the most rigorous criteria in the matter of taxonomy.’

At which point Charles made a face that would have left no-one in any doubt of his views on the matter, before screwing the paper into a ball and turning to Billy. “I can’t believe you came hot-foot all this way just to give me this.”

“No, Mr Charles, but seein’ as I was comin’ with t’other letter I thought as how I may as well bring that as well.”

“The other letter—what other letter?”

Billy fished in his rather grubby pockets and pulled out another envelope. No elaborate wax closure or fine watermarked stationery this time. A single sheet, folded, and clearly unsealed. Charles flashed a glance at Billy, having formed a rather lower estimation of his trustworthiness lately than the one the boy came with. But then he remembered: Billy could barely read. And when he turned to the note it was clear to Charles at once that the writer of it was scarcely much more literate, and certainly far less effusive. A single line only: an address.

“He said it was urgent,” said Billy, eyeing Charles with undisguised interest.

“I bet he did,” muttered Charles, wondering for a moment who it could be from, and concluding that Jacky Jackson was probably the likeliest suspect. He stood with the paper in his hand for a few moments
more, half tempted just to screw this letter up too and throw it in the dung at the side of the road. More than half tempted, in fact, because that’s exactly what he did. Only to change his mind a moment later and scrape about in the mud to get it back. Much to the amusement of both Billy and the gang of scavenger boys who were working the same gutter, and were far better at it than he would ever be. So why the sudden change of heart? Simple: It was already dark, it was Friday night, and the Argyll Rooms would be in full swing, and at full staff. So how could Jacky Jackson be demanding to meet with him urgently, and at an address near Waterloo? It didn’t add up.

“You said he told you it was urgent, Billy—the man who came with this note.”

Billy’s eyes widened in a mock innocence that wasn’t fooling anybody. “Oh, it weren’t no man, Mr Charles. It were just a boy. One of the costers I shouldn’t wonder. ’E said she gave ’im threepence—”

“She?”

“That’s right—’e said it were a woman as gave ’im the note. All dolled-up smart-like, but talked no better than a fishwife.”

Lizzie, was his first thought. But no, of course, not Lizzie. Lizzie was dead. But someone like her—someone like her.

“All right, Billy, you can go. Tell Mr Maddox I’ll be home directly.”

He stood watching as Billy disappeared into the crowd, his mind working and re-working. He could still see the look on Lizzie’s face—the old woman bearing down upon them—and Lizzie opening her mouth to tell him something else.
But meanwhile
, she’d said, he remembered that now, but that was all—he never got to hear the rest. What if she’d been about to suggest someone else he should talk to? Someone else who knew about Sir Julius Cremorne? Someone else besides Lizzie who could tell Charles the real truth—who could supply the missing link between Boscawen and Cremorne, and give Sir Julius his motive for murder?

Someone
like her
.

An hour later he came to a halt under a lamp-post on the corner of a road running parallel with the new Waterloo railway line. A grimy noisy unprepossessing neighbourhood, but notable in 1850 for a very different reason: This was one of Victorian London’s most infamous red-light districts. All along the road the ground-floor windows were uncurtained and fully lit, the dazzle of gas turning each front-room into a cheap peep-show. From where Charles was standing he could see three women lolling in chairs in one room, their breasts completely exposed despite the cold; two more were hanging out of the next-door window calling rowdily to passing men, and in a third room a girl who looked little more than thirteen had her skirt yanked up about her waist and was peeing ostentatiously into a chamber pot, to the whoops and cat-calls of a crowd of young men on the pavement. Another girl—probably her sister, so alike they looked—took a coin from one of them and bent coquettishly towards him over the windowsill, so he could stare down her chemise and have a private panorama of her naked thighs and pubic hair. The house Charles was looking for was two doors farther down, and—unusually for the place and the time—both shuttered and dark. He tried the front door, then went down the narrow passage to the paved court at the back, where the two-storey houses backed directly onto the station shunting yard. The air was thick with soot and raucous with metal and wheels. But someone was listening, all the same, and his first knock brought a movement to an upstairs window, and the sound of feet on the stairs. Then the door opened, but only a crack.

“Who is it?” A girl’s voice.

“Charles Maddox. I had a message to come here.”

“ ’Ave you got it wiv yer? So I knows you’re genuine.”

Charles took out the letter and slid it through the gap. A moment
later the door edged open and the girl appeared. She, like Lizzie, was tiny—less than five feet—and huddled in a thin woollen shawl. Her face was very pale, and her hair brashly and unnaturally blonde.

“Was you followed?” she whispered.

“I don’t think so. I took care.”

“I don’t want no-one knowing you was ’ere. I don’t want to end up cut to pieces like poor Liz.”

She beckoned him down the hall to a tiny back room, which was clearly her place of work as well as rest. There was a brass bed in the corner, draped in cheap embroidered moreen coverings evidently designed to look luxurious. The rest of the room was bare, apart from a table and chair in one corner, and a small armoire hung with a pale-coloured
peignoir
trimmed with feathers. The curtains were drawn and a lamp on a table in the corner threw shadows across white walls blotched here and there with damp. The only decoration was the mantel-shelf, which carried a choice collection of copper-plate impressions from the Galaxy Gallery of British Beauty, showing society ladies in a sequence of stylish gowns and equally stylish attitudes. It’s not a species that has ever excited much interest for Charles (though its subtle variations of plumage, habitat, and courtship ritual are as complex a taxonomic challenge, in their way, as anything presented to the Royal Geographical Society), but even at that distance he could recognise Lady Dedlock, she who occupies so central a place in the fashionable world, posed on a terrace, with her fur-lined shawl draped over a stone urn and a heavy gold bracelet on her arm.

The girl stooped and turned the lamp up a little, and Charles saw for the first time that one cheek was swollen and badly bruised. Seeing his glance she turned away and put her hand to her face.

“Who did that to you—it wasn’t—”

She shook her head. “No, it were just Arnie. Just a little knock to keep me in my place. He means it kindly, mostly.”

Charles has seen it many times before, but still doesn’t understand
it—the way these girls cling to their pimps, taking any sort of bad treatment as no more than they deserve and considering it a mark of character to bear pain without protesting. And it’s not just the prostitutes either; he once caught one of the coster-lads beating his girl almost senseless, merely for talking to another man, but the girl refused to complain, saying she liked it when he larruped her—’cause it proved he still cared.

“What’s your name?” he asked.

“You don’t need to know that. Best you don’t. I know who
you
are. That’s what matters. And more to the point, Liz said I could trust yer. I saw ’er that night. It was the last time I ever did.”

“So you know what I was asking her about.”

She nodded. “She said you was all right, and I could talk to yer. Said it wouldn’t come back on me. But that was before someone took a carving knife to ’er. Poor cow.” She folded her arms. “So what I want to know is, what are you goin’ to do to make sure that don’t ’appen to me?”

“I can’t make you any promises—”

“So why the hell should—”

They had raised their voices and Charles was suddenly aware of a noise in the adjoining room. A whine at first, rising to a howl. The girl threw him an angry look then crossed quickly to the far door. He heard her hush the child, and the creak of a rocked cradle. A few moments later she appeared again, and closed the door behind her.

“Look.” Charles moved towards her. “I think you may already be in danger—whatever it is you know, it makes you a threat to this man, whether you talk to me or not. But if you do, I will at least have some chance of bringing him to justice.” He took a step closer. She barely reached his shoulder and he could smell the fear on her now, sharpening the cheap scent.

“It would be for Lizzie,” he said softly. “Justice for Lizzie.”

She opened her mouth, but then stopped. Living the life she did, she probably had a pretty good idea of her chances and they weren’t good.

“I could give you some money,” he said, reading what he thought might be crossing her mind. “You could get out of London for a while. Take the child to the seaside—”

“
Her
. It’s a little gel. And anyway, Arnie wouldn’t like it.”

Charles nodded slowly, wondering whether that was what she really feared or whether she was more concerned she might lose the only real protector she’d ever had, even if he did beat her half senseless on a weekly basis.

The conversation was going nowhere; it was a risk, but he didn’t feel he had much to lose. He took the now dog-eared sheet of newsprint from his pocket and held it out to her. “This is a likeness of Sir Julius Cremorne.”

The girl looked, then turned her face quickly away.

“You recognise him.”

She swallowed. The moment hung in the balance: She could go either way and he wasn’t at all sure which it would be. But then—

“Neither Liz nor me ever knew ’is real name. None of the girls do. All we know is ’e’s a bastard. A bloody disgusting vicious
bastard
.”

The loathing in her voice reverberated like a curse in the narrow room, and the child whimpered and stirred beyond the door. Charles looked at her. “Is he really so much worse than all the rest?”

Her venom shifted suddenly to scorn. “Oh yeah,
much
worse. Shows you what the likes of you know about it. I’ve been raped and buggered and belted more times than I can count, but nothing,
nothing
like what he done to me. And what makes it worse is that your Sir Julius bloody Cremorne is only interested in little girls—or those of us as can pass ourselves off as such. Same type every time. Always blondes. And the younger the better. Ten, eleven—one of the pounceys even found him a girl of six once. I can look younger than I am ’cause I’m little, but I still ’ad to dress up like I was straight out of the
nursery. Ribbons, ringlets, pink dress, the whole friggin’ farrago. He even gave me a bloody doll to hold while he was on top of me. Couldn’t seem to get it up otherwise. And never took ’is clothes off the ’ole time, not even ’is gloves. Then afterwards ’e makes me take the ’ole lot off and watches me take a bath. Even then I thought it was bloody weird. Then when I got out and turned round ’e was holding this ’orrible-looking knife—Christ, I thought me last hour ’ad come. But it turned out all ’e wanted was a curl of hair. You know—from down there. For ’is
collection
, ’e says.”