Theft of Life (40 page)

‘It was.’

‘Mr Glass was a particular friend of Mrs Smith, was he not?’

William nodded. ‘It is my understanding he has been trying to find the person or persons who killed her.’

Mrs Service sniffed. ‘Perhaps you had better come along then. I assume David will have his pistols about him?’

‘Yes, ma’am.’

‘I think I shall have a word with Mr Graves before we leave. You may put the children into the carriage when they come down.’

The children were very surprised to find that Graves was coming with them, and not a little perturbed. Mrs Service did ask once more for some explanation of their behaviour in the carriage, but the children avoided her gaze and Stephen lifted his chin in a way that reminded her painfully of his mother. ‘We just wish to visit Eustache,’ he said stoutly. Susan was more nervous of her disapproval. She put her hand into Mrs Service’s as they rode through the avenues of the west of the city and into the narrower and more crowded streets of the east. ‘It is nothing bad,’ she said, and there was an element of pleading in her voice which meant that Mrs Service could not help squeezing her hand.

The atmosphere in the shop was strange from the moment Mr Graves opened the door for her and Mrs Service entered with the children following round her skirts like goslings. At the ring of the bell the clerk’s head snapped up, but as soon as he saw them, his expression became one of deep disappointment and distress. Mrs Service politely asked after Eustache, and the clerk, looking distracted, disappeared into the back of the shop, only to reappear a moment later to say Eustache wasn’t there and must have stepped out to the bakehouse with Joshua, the apprentice. Mrs Service said they would wait and the children huddled into the far corner of the shop floor, pretending to look at the books but obviously in close debate.

Graves was silent and serious, watching the children. Mrs Service smiled at the clerk. ‘Mr Glass is not here today? We met very briefly a few days ago at the house of the late Mrs Smith. I am Mrs Service.’

‘Cutter, ma’am,’ he said, glancing towards the door again and tapping his fingers on the counter top. ‘I remember you from the fetching of Master Eustache and the young lady there. No, Mr Glass hasn’t shown his face here this morning, and to tell you the truth, ma’am,’ he leaned towards her over the desk and lowered his voice, ‘we are beginning to worry ourselves a little. Mr Sharp and Constable Miller have gone to his lodgings just this minute to see if perhaps he’s slept on this morning, such times we’ve had of it of late, and so that’s my hope. He’s been sleeping and is this moment buttoning up his coat. But I have a fear, a presentiment. My mother used to have them, and now I feel it too. Just here.’ He stabbed at a spot in his chest just under the breastbone. ‘Our shop was broken into the night before last, and we drove Mr Glass off so we could clean it up for him. We thought he’d be back yesterday evening, were
sure
he’d be here creeping in with the light this morning, but he’s not here and now I have a presentiment.’

‘That is uncomfortable,’ Mrs Service said mildly. She was about to ask something more when a boy came tripping out of the back room and looked about him. His face showed the same pattern of hope and then dismay that Cutter’s had when they first came in. ‘He’s not here,’ he said.

Cutter looked mournful. ‘Joshua, where’s Master Eustache? I thought he was with you.’

The boy shook his head slowly. ‘No … he said he had an errand and slipped out. But that was a while ago.’

Graves had run through his stock of patience, and now he turned on the children. ‘Enough of this! I am happy for you to have your secrets, but Eustache is missing, as is Mr Glass, and I think it is time for you to be open with me.’

Susan took a half-step forward, but it was Jonathan who spoke first. ‘It’s all right, Suzy, I’ll do it.’ He looked steadily up at his guardian. ‘Mr Glass had Eustache read the manuscripts in his office …’

The door to the house of the private palace of Sir Charles was opened not by one of the immaculate footmen whom Harriet had seen on her previous visit, but by Mrs Jennings herself. Harriet was astonished; Mrs Jennings apparently very disappointed.

‘I thought you were the hackney carriage,’ she said by way of explanation. ‘I am very sorry for it, Mrs Westerman, but no one here is receiving today.’

She was beginning to close the door on her, but Harriet put her hand against it to prevent her.

‘I must speak to Mrs Trimnell, and at once.’

‘That trollop isn’t here,’ Mrs Jennings said and tried to close the door again. Harriet’s patience snapped.

‘Mrs Jennings, you shall let me in and we shall discuss this inside. I have just come from Mr Sawbridge’s rooms where he sits dead and drenched in his own blood, and unless you will have me scream out the news to your neighbours, you will let me in.’

The old woman hesitated, then opened the door fully and made a somewhat ironic curtsey. Harriet moved past her into the hallway. The impression of luxury and taste with which the hall was designed to overawe its visitors was somewhat marred by the pair of trunks in the hall. One was open and a footman was apparently repacking it. It was surrounded by a number of clothes and some smaller cases that Harriet expected to have been stowed inside the larger ones. Mrs Jennings picked up one of these smaller cases and opened it. As far as Harriet could see from where she stood, it contained a number of trinkets, those small items of jewellery every woman collects and may be worth nothing, but from which no female could separate herself.

‘Where is Mrs Trimnell?’

‘In one of the Covent Garden stews, if she has finally learned her place. I found her yesterday afternoon pawing at Randolph on the settee in the Blue Salon and told her what I thought of her.’

‘And then?’

‘She had a short discussion with Randolph and left the house rather quickly. She did not come home yesterday evening. The air in Portman Square is purer already.’ She removed a piece of lace from the box and handed it to a footman standing behind her. ‘Put that back in my room, Parker, if you’d be so kind. So her father is dead? I never liked him. I was going to send her luggage to his rooms, but they may as well go to her old place on Cheapside, I suppose.’

‘Mrs Jennings, it is of the greatest importance that I find her. Can you really tell me nothing that might be of use? Is Sir Charles at home?’

She clicked the box shut. ‘No, Mrs Westerman, I cannot. And no, Sir Charles is not here. He is gone up to the Surrey house. I must ask you to leave now. Once I have made sure that woman has not stuffed her trunks with our silverware, I have to arrange for his luggage to be sent on.’

‘Randolph Jennings perhaps?’

‘He is still asleep.’

‘No, I’m not.’ They looked up to see him walking down the stairs. ‘What? Is that Lucinda’s baggage? I ordered it to be packed in her rooms.’

Mrs Jennings pursed her lips. ‘Go away, Randolph, I’m out of patience with you. I would not let this luggage leave until I have checked it. Mrs Trimnell and her oafish father are not to be received here any more and you are to go up to Paradise this afternoon.’

The young man seemed remarkably unconcerned. ‘I knew Father intended to cut ties with them since Tuesday. Dr Fischer dragged him out of the coffee house to tell him he should do so, but I did not think he intended you to make it into a spectacle for the servants and our visitor.’

Mrs Jennings was unabashed. ‘The visitor was uninvited and unluckily timed. And I will not have that woman steal from us.’

‘I think we can spare anything she can carry,’ Randolph said, and with such a sharpness to his voice that Mrs Jennings started. She put down the case she was rifling through.

‘Geoffrey, you may repack,’ she said and left them, walking up the stairs with her back straight and not looking at Randolph as she passed him.

Once she had gone a sufficient distance, Randolph finished his elegant saunter down the stairway and put his hand out to Harriet. ‘Good morning, Mrs Westerman. Tell me, is it true your footman knocked Oxford over in the muck the other day? I heard the story in the club, but thought it too good to be true.’

‘It is.’

‘Capital. No wonder he is off sulking somewhere or other. Can I be of any help to you?’

‘I am looking for Mrs Trimnell. Her father is dead.’

‘Is he?’ Jennings looked surprised. ‘How so?’

‘His throat was cut.’

‘I had no idea he would take being exiled from our family so much to heart.’ He snorted. Harriet looked at him with distaste. The gilded youth in his gaudy setting.

‘There was an attachment between you and Mrs Trimnell. How can you take this news so carelessly?’ she said.

He looked down on her. ‘Lucinda was entertaining company, and I was kind enough to her, Mrs Westerman. But she has been behaving a little strangely since her husband died. She seemed to think she had greater claims on me than she did. Silly girl. She never really did understand her place in the world. Some women are like that.’

Harriet resisted the temptation to slap his face. ‘So you have not seen her or her father since Mrs Jennings found you together yesterday afternoon.’

‘No, I have not. She went running off to her father, but I think she expected me to follow her. Of course, I did not. My own father went to them to make certain they understood that connections between us were at an end.’

‘Your father went to see Mr Sawbridge last night?’

Jennings nodded and stifled a yawn. ‘Yes. As I said, he told me on Tuesday he’d heard rumours that father and daughter had been involved in something unpleasant. He meant to do it all very gently, but then Aunt Maria found Mrs Trimnell and me together and it all came rather to a head. Lucinda ran off to Daddy, and Drax and Pa went over there later in the evening to say we were going to have no more to do with them. I am quite sure Pa would have made a generous contribution to the family fortune; he always seemed to be giving Sawbridge money, but the man must have taken the separation hard.’

E
USTACHE OPENED HIS EYES,
and the pain in the side of his head tore into white light. He squeezed his eyes shut again until it dulled to a throb; meanwhile, a heavy nausea had seized him. He was lying on a couch in a small room, divided from another by folding panels. There were voices coming from the far side. One belonged to Fischer, but the other he did not recognise.

‘If you let a child goad you in that way, Fischer, I am afraid the problem is yours. I sympathise, but there is somewhere else I simply must be.’

‘But I burned the manuscript! Do you not owe me something for that? The stories that were in there about you, Drax, almost turned my stomach. Please, you must tell me what to do.’

‘Fischer, you
know
what you have to do! Get rid of the boy and do it quickly and quietly. Good God, you’re almost as bad as that Trimnell woman. Letting your temper run away with you and then whining to other people to clear up after you.’ There was a weary anger in the man’s voice. ‘You could have sent the boy home and denied everything if he ever told Graves about the manuscript, but oh no. Now Graves will have you on charges of assault. So stop snivelling into your brandy and do what needs to be done – or face the fact that your flourishing career as the handsome shepherd of the city sheep is over.’

‘Not everyone finds killing as easy as you do, Drax.’

There was a pause followed by a theatrical sigh. ‘Very well, I shall show you.’

The panels were thrown back and a man in a plum-coloured coat with a monkey perched on his shoulder came into the room. Eustache tried to push himself upwards – shout, strike out – but he could hardly control his limbs.

‘Now then, my boy.’ Drax gathered him up almost carelessly, sat beside him on the couch and held him in place with his left hand while with his right he shut Eustache’s mouth and clamped his nose. Eustache tried to struggle and kick, but Drax simply adjusted his hold slightly. Lights exploded behind his eyes. After a few moments Drax released him and Eustache took in a shuddering breath.

‘There – you see, Fischer? Quite simple.’

Fischer was peering at them from the doorway. ‘Won’t you …?’

‘No. It’s time to get
your
hands dirty, man.’

‘I’ll pay you?’ Fischer was hopeful and pleading.

‘Pay me?’ Drax still had hold of Eustache’s arms and the pressure on them suddenly increased. ‘I have enough money, thank you, Fischer. What, do you think I am Sawbridge? And don’t pretend there was anything about me in those pages that came as a revelation to you. I have heard you and Jennings both joking over your wine about how I know when to cut my losses. The ones that were too sick to be worth saving, I got rid of. You knew that.’

‘There’s nothing …’ Eustache’s voice was slurred.

‘What, lad?’ Drax grinned down at him. The monkey had its head on one side, and was listening with its master.

‘In the manuscript. There’s nothing about what you did. It only says you purchased the sick ones off the ship … tried to make them healthy and sell them on.’

‘Really? Oh, that’s famous! So in comparison to the rest I must seem a saint?’

Eustache managed to nod and Drax laughed out loud again before wagging a finger at Fischer. ‘And you said … oh, what a naughty man you are.’ He turned back to Eustache. ‘Well, my dear. Now you know what happened with those whom I judged in the end to be too sick for my skills. Though if they fought me off I might keep them a while longer just to see.’ He smiled and the monkey stood straight and pirouetted. ‘Well, I certainly won’t kill you
now
. Not even as a favour to an old friend. Goodbye, Fischer. I doubt we will be seeing each other for a while. I feel a sudden urge to travel.’

Eustache watched him go then looked at Fischer, trying to think. Fischer still looked nervous. He could be kicked, bitten. Fischer turned away and filled his brandy glass, his hands trembling so hard he spilled some of it. Drax had taken Eustache by surprise. This man would not. If he could just carry on being scared and drinking his brandy for a few minutes longer, then Eustache could get his breath and perhaps the sick pain in his head might lessen a little. He was not afraid though. His anger came back to him like a friend. Even as he was gathering it to himself, trying to force it through his body to make do until his own strength might return, Fischer downed his drink in great shaking gulps then strode over to the door and turned the key.