The Whispering Gallery (23 page)

“Just a note to a friend – in case I don't come in tomorrow.”

“Ach, Steadman. With these three good men on your side, nothing can go wrong.”

“Well, that's put the kibosh on it.”

“What does that mean?”

Johnny sighed. “Nothing important.”

“If you say so. Mr Stone is impressed with your work, Steadman – and so am I. It will be front-page news tomorrow. I do not often say such things, but I would regret most highly were anything to happen to you. I wish you good luck.”

“Thank you, sir. You're making me nervous.”

The German waddled off. “
Sir?
You've really got the abdabs, haven't you?” Dimeo and Tanfield, clad in Macintoshes, stared down at him. Their eyes shone with excitement.

“You're hardly the Praetorian Guard.”

“We're all you've got, though, so be nice to us.” PDQ nodded to the others. “Come on, it's time to get into position. Taxis will be thin on the ground in this weather.” As if on cue, the heavens opened and the desultory spitting that had been the first precipitation in almost three weeks was replaced by rain like gleaming stilettos that stabbed everything beneath it. A sweet-sour scent filled the air as weeks of dust were rinsed away. Those closest to the windows scrambled to close them. As Johnny left the building it was like stepping into a cold store. The sudden drop in temperature was remarkable. His gabardine was at home but he didn't mind in the least getting soaked to the skin. It was as if Gillespie's filth were being sluiced off him. He felt refreshed and energised.

The taxi – with a sign saying STEADMAN in the driver's window – was waiting right in front of the entrance. Johnny pushed his way through the forest of black umbrellas and hopped into the back. The storm cast everything in an eerie half-light. Fate appeared to be on his side: any cop trying to trail him would have great difficulty keeping him in sight.

“Evening, Guvnor.” The greeting was barely audible. The cabbie, in the
de rigueur
cloth cap, released the handbrake, let out the clutch and nosed his way into the crawling traffic. Rain always slowed it down.

“Where are we going?”

The answer was drowned out by another clap of thunder. Johnny was surprised the driver could see anything through his dark glasses.

“What did you say?”

“You'll find out soon enough.”

Johnny, irritated by the whispered reply, sat back. Perhaps he had been paid to keep the destination a secret.

They turned right into Fetter Lane and headed north. At Holborn Circus the driver took the exit to Hatton Garden. Johnny resisted the impulse to look back to see if there were any other taxis behind them. When they turned right again into Clerkenwell Road, Johnny guessed they were heading for St John's Square. Surely Bravard hadn't returned home?

As they approached the entrance to the square the driver suddenly accelerated and shot down Albemarle Street, a short cut-through from the square to St John Street. He then took the next left into Aylesbury Street – throwing Johnny across the back seat – right into Woodbridge Street and left into Sans Walk. Johnny's heart sank. There was no way any other vehicle could have followed them.

“Here we are.” The driver took off his cap and glasses and turned to face his passenger. A flash of lightning – which made Johnny see red – revealed a face of two halves. One was instantly recognisable as the debonair Joshua Bravard; the other, eyeless and corrugated, looked like toasted cheese. No wonder the photograph in the newspapers had failed to produce a response.

“Hello, Johnny.” The hoarseness of his voice added to the horror. “We meet at last. Do come in.”

The taxi had stopped by a high wall on which a plaque notified passers-by that six people had been killed and fifty injured when a Fenian bomb had exploded on the spot in 1867. The Irishmen had been trying to spring two of their fellows from the Clerkenwell House of Detention, but had succeeded only in destroying the wall and a row of houses opposite. The prison had been demolished at the turn of the century and Hugh Myddleton School now stood on the site. What were they doing here? Bravard clearly wasn't worried about being followed if he intended to leave the cab right here.

“This way.” Bravard unlocked a door in the wall and stood aside to let him enter. The windowless room was little more than six feet square but was furnished with a burning oil lamp, ottoman, Turkey rug and a full-length mirror that took up the whole of one wall. “This is the only place where I allow mirrors to be displayed. I don't have to be invisible here. I can be my true self.”

“You do surprise me. Did you crack all the others? No wonder you've had such bad luck.”

Bravard snickered humourlessly. “What have you done with the taxi-driver?”

“Nothing. It's mine – so useful for getting around unnoticed. As you can see, I have some difficulty in that department.”

Johnny looked round the tiny room. What on earth could it be used for? A head-doctor's consulting room?

Bravard watched him with amusement. “The police were here on Monday. I found the lock smashed in later that evening. The fools didn't search hard enough though.” He pressed a switch behind the frame of the mirror. The looking-glass swung back to reveal an iron door. “This is all that remains of the prison. My father used the cellars to store his extensive wine collection, but, as you're about to find out, I sold it and found a far more interesting use for the space. I only drink champagne.”

He picked up the lamp and unlocked the door to reveal an iron staircase. As soon as the well-oiled hinges turned Johnny was hit by the vilest of odours. It was a mixture of rotting flowers, blocked drains and open graves. The stench made Johnny retch. His eyes began to water.

“I can't go down there. I can't.”

“Don't be such a sissy. I know it's all right for me to say – the gas destroyed my sense of smell – but if you want to save Simkins, you must.”

Johnny tentatively stepped towards the door and tried to breathe only through his mouth. A hard shove in the small of his back sent him cartwheeling down the metal steps into the darkness. He landed, dazed and bruised, in a heap on an iron gantry.

“Why don't you take off those wet clothes?”

“No, thanks.”

“I won't ask again.” Bravard held up a blood-stained scalpel.

Johnny quickly stripped and stood there shivering – out of fear rather than the cold. If the maniac thought being nude would stop him running back into the street, he was mistaken.

They stood on a suspended walkway which ran above six cells. Bravard kicked his discarded clothes – and PDQ's cosh – over the edge and held up the lamp. It was a charnel house. A mirror was screwed to the back wall of each cell. Four of them held mangled corpses in various stages of decay. A fifth contained a naked woman chained to the wall by an iron collar round her neck. Was it a trick of the light, or did she move?

The final compartment on the left had been fitted out as a makeshift operating theatre. Simkins, a leather gag in his mouth, was strapped to the table. His eyes were closed.

“How did you get him here?”

“I invited him up to my suite for a drink. The promise of more champagne was all it took. Of course I slipped a little something extra into his glass. He went out like a light. The staff at the Savoy are extremely helpful – especially when you're known to be a big tipper. Two page-boys helped me load the trunk into the taxi.” He slowly looked him up and down. Johnny felt like a bullock at auction. “Let us descend. After you . . .” As Johnny passed him he stabbed him in the right buttock. “Get a move on. I've waited for this moment long enough.”

The corridor below the gantry consisted of a succession of brick ovals which made it necessary to step over the foot-high divisions that separated the door to each cell. Prisoners would have only been able to see above their heads – if there had been any light.

They entered the sixth cell. Bravard lit some candles and took off his own clothes.

“Don't worry, I'm not ambisexual like Henry. The blood sprays everywhere.” He held the lamp up so Johnny could appreciate his naked body. “Recognise me now?”

“Why would I?”

“Our paths crossed at the Cave of the Golden Calf. I was painted gold and in a black cape.”

Johnny remembered Bravard's enigmatic smile. “It was pretty dark. Why were you there?”

“Zick invited me. I've known him for years.”

“You can tell a lot about a man from the company he keeps.” Johnny knew his only hope was to keep Bravard talking. His three musketeers, if they had somehow managed to follow him, might just recognise the taxi parked upstairs. He was already regretting not involving the police. “Was it you who knocked me out and pissed on me last week?”

“Certainly not.” Bravard laughed. “I'd have made sure you were conscious before the baptism. There's no point in humiliating someone if they can't appreciate it.” To demonstrate the point, he tilted the table that faced the full-length mirror. He ran his finger over Simkins's outstretched body. The shaved scrotum was crudely stitched together with black yarn.

“It's a terribly simple process. You slice just to the side of the ridge that runs down the middle of the sac known as the raphe, snip the spermatic cords and then tie them off. Of course the writhing makes it a little more tricky. I don't believe in anaesthetic. Pain is what reminds us we're alive.”

“That must have hurt a lot too.” Johnny nodded at the torturer's disfigured face.

“You'll find out soon enough. Although acid will do to you what fire did to me. What really hurt though was your refusal to look at me.”

“When?”

“You don't remember then?” He turned down the corners of his mouth in mock sadness. “We almost met a few years ago. Why d'you think I chose you?”

“I don't know – that's why I'm here.”

Bravard pointed to the wall where the following words had been daubed in red paint – or blood: BEAUTY IS NOT SKIN DEEP.

“I was in Colney Hatch.” He came closer to whisper in Johnny's ear. His breath smelled of Parma violets. “I'd just been transferred from St Mary's, Sidcup – living proof that not all pioneering plastic surgery is successful – and was having, shall we say, a little difficulty in adjusting to my altered appearance. You came beetling round, full of compassion, a bleeding heart with no bleeding time for ugly beggars like me.”

“I was told not to stare. I couldn't speak to everyone.”

“You ignored me.”

“Not deliberately – even if I had spoken to you, I wouldn't have been allowed to use your name. Is that what this is all about? How an unintended snub made you into a mass murderer? You must be really sick.”

“You were flirting with one of the nurses. I couldn't believe your insensitivity, chatting up a woman in front of men – men who had served their country, men who were still paying a terrible price for their bravery, men who would never enjoy the company of a beautiful woman again.”

“I was chatting her up to get more information. Flattery sometimes gets you everywhere. You don't know much about journalism, do you?”

“Not as much as I do about the human body. Do you remember what you said to the bitch as you walked down the burns ward?”

“Of course not. It was years ago. I was on your side. Whatever it was, I didn't intend to cause offence.”

“Well you most surely did. You said: ‘Beauty's only skin deep.'” He laughed ironically. “I'm going to prove just how wrong you were. The miraculous pumping of the heart, the exquisite coral of the brain, the rainbow iridescence of the intestines . . . I shall show you all these things tonight.”

Johnny was struck dumb. His mouth was so dry his tongue was shrivelling – and that wasn't the only thing. The thought of being forced to watch the mysteries of his own body – or Henry's – being wrenched into the light made him break out into a cold sweat. It would be no good refusing to look. He remembered the lidless eyes of Helena Nudd.

Bravard lit more candles so that the operating table was circled with a warm yellow glow. Glass jars, each containing a human organ, gleamed in the shadows. “It's amazing what people will tell you, if you know just where to press. Henry hates his father because he loved his late brother far more than him. He likes you because you remind him of a childhood chum who disappeared before he could tell him how he felt about him. Blackmail, though, is a nasty business. I couldn't understand why you suddenly lost interest in me. Simkins described the photograph he used to persuade you. That's why I presented you with his balls. I've cured him for ever of his unhealthy interest in male genitalia.”

He slapped Simkins across the face. “Wakey, wakey, sleeping beauty!”

Henry's eyes shot open and, remembering where he was and what had happened, widened with fear. Bravard removed the gag.

“He can't talk. He hasn't had as much as a drop of water in over eighteen hours. His throat will soon be so swollen he'll have difficulty breathing. But you're here now. It's time to change places.”

Johnny flashed on the man standing at the foot of his bed in the nightmare. He knew he was as good as dead if he lay down on the table. Bravard began undoing the straps that held Simkins in place. Black terror, pure naked terror, began to stir in Johnny's stomach. It was similar to the claustrophobia that sometimes started to uncoil inside him. This sensation though was far stronger. He had been a total berk to come here alone. A sudden draught made the candles gutter. Bravard, inscribing bloody whorls on Simkins's stomach, seemed oblivious.

“Why the pictures of the saints?” His words were little more than a whisper. “Surely you don't consider yourself a martyr? Talk about delusions of grandeur. They died because they believed in something. What do you believe in?”