Tom All-Alone's (25 page)

And pat they come. Wheeler flushed, fidgety, transparently a guilty thing surprised; Charles pale, slightly hectic still about the eyes, but from the way he starts to examine the corpse, his presence of mind has not yet abandoned him. Bucket observes him for a few moments and sighs silently to himself. He has few regrets of a professional nature, but this young man is one of them. And there is something preoccupying Charles now – something that seems to be almost literally eating away at him, that Bucket would dearly love to fathom. His forefinger twitches in sympathy, as if itching to prod and probe this little mystery and make all plain. He watches as Charles circles the table and comes to a halt by the old man's head, where the sheet is pulled tight to the drooping chin. Even in life Tulkinghorn was a parched thing, a thing of sallow paper and old desiccated confidences, but in death he seems to have shrunk back inside his own bones. The blotched and withered skin sags from his skull and the old hair clings in scraps to the wrinkled scalp. From dust we come, and to dust we return, but in Tulkinghorn's case the process seems to be starting long before he is committed to the ground. Bucket knows well enough what lies beneath that all-concealing sheet, and
Charles must surely guess, but all the same the young man takes a deep breath before he takes hold of it and pulls it back. It seems the lawyer is a lawyer yet, clad still in his time-honoured suit of black, his lustreless knee-breeches tied with ribbons, and his wilted white stock. But this impeccable palette of monochrome tones glares now with colour – colour almost scandalous in its gaudy flamboyance, its ostentatious indifference to all those qualities of silence and reserve and anonymity the old man once stood for. It's doubtful anyone ever saw Tulkinghorn, night or day, with his coat unbuttoned, but this particular indignity is only the first of many his dead flesh must now bear. The fine lawn shirt is soaked with a deep red taint that spreads from neck to gut, but the red is rawest, and the stain is densest, and the bloody cloth is bloodiest, around a small tight black hole in the centre of his chest, hard by the heart few of those who had dealings with him ever believed he possessed. Charles stands there a moment unmoving, and Bucket nods unseen, as if reading his thoughts. Who, indeed, would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him? But a minute later he hears Wheeler hiss at his companion from the doorway, ‘Come on, Chas – we ain't got all day.' He's so nervous he can barely keep still, and keeps darting his head into the corridor, then back again into the room. ‘'Ave you got what you came for, because if you 'ave, let's get out of 'ere, and quick.'

‘I was right,' says Charles slowly. ‘See this bullet wound? It's far too small to have been made with a bullet from my pistol.'

He looks again at the corpse. ‘In fact, I think the shot was fired from only a foot or so away. That means Tulkinghorn knew his killer, and trusted him. Or at the very least saw no threat in having him at such close quarters. Which is precisely the opposite of what Bucket is alleging where I'm concerned.
If he's going to rely on my supposed threats to make his case stick, how does he explain the old man allowing me to get so close?'

Wheeler edges nearer, interested despite himself. ‘But if it were close range there'd be powder marks and you've got next to no chance findin' 'em. That moth-eaten old rag's too dark to show anythin'.'

Charles turns the coat against the light and is forced to agree. But as Bucket already suspects, he's the last and very possibly the best pupil his great-uncle ever had. A moment later Bucket sees him dip his head against the body and breathe deeply. A gesture, incidentally, that you would have seen Bucket himself performing no more than an hour ago, when the body was first brought in. Which means he knows exactly what conclusion the young man is drawing: overlaid on the dankness of old clothes and the sweet metallic aroma of new blood, there is the faint but unmistakable smell of burnt gunpowder. When Charles straightens up, there is a hard little smile on his face, but the smile dies when he lifts his eyes and sees who else is now in the room.

‘Well done, young Maddox,' says Mr Bucket genially. ‘You're a quick study, that's what
you
are, and no mistake. And so you think you've found the answer, do you? And I suppose, moreover, that you'll soon be a-persuading me that this is the answer, and expecting me to unlock these doors and put away my cuffs, and escort you with all due courtesy to the front door? Of course you do,' he continues conversationally, ‘and very odd indeed it would be if you didn't.'

‘Don't blame Sam,' says Charles quickly. ‘It's my fault. I persuaded him to let me in.'

‘Oh I know all about that,' says Bucket, tapping his nose with his busy forefinger. ‘And you do right by him, so you do, for taking the blame. Now don't
you
be a-fretting,' he says,
throwing a glance in Wheeler's direction. ‘I know what's what, and who's who, and loyalty's a quality I prize a good deal even when it's misplaced. As it looks to be in this case. Well then, I'll tell you something, young Wheeler. I think you'd be best, all things taken into account, to take yourself back down to the desk and wait for me there. I'll be wanting a word with you in due course, but I have one or two for Mr Maddox here first.'

Wheeler shoots an agonized look in Charles' direction – which the latter does not see – then stumbles out of the room. Bucket hears his feet in the stone passage, first walking, then quickening to a run.

‘Now then,' he resumes, ‘I heard what you were a-saying about the deceased, and I am obliged to say that I am minded to agree with you.'

‘Then you'll let me go—'

Mr Bucket's finger is raised in the air.

‘But if it wasn't my gun—'

‘Don't you be jumping to conclusions,' says Mr Bucket, ‘and you'll find it goes much better for you. Now,' he says, ‘I'm sure you realize, being such a quick study, that it would be as easy as winking for you to have borrowed another gun. That you might a-done so precisely for that reason – to lay me off the trail.'

‘Where could I have found one like it? This gun can't have been much larger than a pocket pistol – I don't think I've ever even seen one, much less fired one.'

‘Ah, but you would know someone who has, I think?' replies Mr Bucket affably. ‘You do, after all, frequent a well-known shooting gallery, where all types of tastes are catered for, and all types of firearms are readily to be had. Indeed I'll bet a pound that if I were to rummage about a bit in the said establishment, I might find any number of the like weapons, and recently discharged to boot.'

‘On the contrary—' begins Charles, before faltering. It seems he was about to come to the trooper's stout defence, but something is suddenly holding him back. Something, muses Bucket, like a case of little pearl-handled guns, kept neatly in a drawer. But he says nothing of this, and merely watches Charles with his most watchful eyes and smiles his most knowing smile.

‘As it happens,' the inspector resumes presently, as if for all the world there had been no interruption at all, ‘I am inclined to believe you on this occasion. Which is lucky for you. Even luckier, I should say, is the fact that certain new information has come into my possession, which diminishes the suspicions I had entertained of you and raises them in regard to another party. That being the case, I am willing to discharge you, for the present, on your own recognizance. But with certain conditions. That does not surprise you, I am sure.'

‘And they are?' asks Charles evenly.

‘First, that you keep away from that shooting gallery and have no intercourse – written or otherwise – with the trooper who runs it.'

The young man gives little away at this, beyond the slightest of flickers behind the eyes. He's a cool customer, thinks Bucket, and that's a fact.

‘And if I refuse?'

‘Oh, you won't do that, I'll wager,' replies Bucket complacently. ‘You're a clever young man, and a sensible one on the whole, and your business is a business that requires a reputation for trustworthiness and an unsullied record. I'm sure it ain't necessary to say to a man like you that it's the best and wisest way that this little matter of your arrest should not come to your clients' ears.'

Charles' face is set; he knows, and Bucket knows, that he has him there.

‘And the other conditions?'

Bucket smiles. ‘In a case such as this one, all is not always what it seems. In my experience, and I dare say in yours, things are apt to come to light, and secrets laid bare, that in other circumstances would no doubt have lain long dead and buried. I say it again, and you would do well to heed my words: all is not always what it seems, even to those most closely involved.'

He regards Charles with a thoughtful eye. ‘I am asking you, lad, as a present member of the Detective to a former one, to trust me. I am sure you see me, just at present, as your opponent. Your enemy, even. You know a little of my dealings with Mr Tulkinghorn, and you have extrapolated that little into a very great deal indeed. Moreover, you have picked up other bits and pieces here and there, and have fitted them likewise into the same great puzzle. I can see how this has occurred. I might even – in your place – have made the like error. But it is an error, Charles. I hope it will not be long before you see that. I can say no more than this for the present, but you have heard me say often enough, to the victims in like unhappy affairs, that I will not turn out of my way, right or left, or take a sleep, or a wash, or a shave,' this with a rather pertinent glance at Charles, ‘till I have found what I go in search of. And when that day comes, you may discover that we are, in fact, working the same case – albeit from opposite ends.'

‘And you ask me to believe that – to take it on trust? On your word merely?'

‘Dear me, no,' says Bucket, ‘not on that alone. On your knowledge of me, and my methods, and the fact that I learned those methods from a master of our art. Now you know who I mean, and I know you know, so we need say no more on that.'

They stand, eyes locked, for perhaps a minute, then Charles shakes his head. ‘I'm sure you'll understand,' he says drily, mocking the detective's words, ‘that I don't have much of a
mind to accept your word, on this occasion. I will keep away from the gallery, but that is as much as I am prepared to pledge.'

Bucket nods slowly. ‘And you still refuse to tell me where you were last evening?'

Charles shakes his head. The livid anger has returned to his face. ‘At ten o'clock last night I was with a woman – though not in the way
you
probably think. She was helping me. But as I'm sure you are only too well aware, anyone who offers to help me these days has a more than passing chance of turning up dead very soon after. I don't want any more needless deaths on my conscience, and I'm certainly not going to be responsible for handing you another victim – you or Sir Julius Cremorne.'

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.'

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., had now been rescinded, and he would be welcome to join them at their forthcoming meeting, at which Dr Joseph Dalton Hooker would be discussing his ‘Fourth Excursion into the Passes of Thibet 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, Mister 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 was 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 raucously 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 further down, and – unusually for the place and the time – was 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 on to 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 recognize 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 said.

‘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,' said Charles, moving 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 recognize 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 'olding 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.'

By now the girl had started shivering uncontrollably. ‘State I were in by then, I didn't care what 'e took as long as 'e left and didn't come back. I burned everything 'e made me wear soon as I shut the door. Bastard pays well, though, I'll give 'im that. Couple'a sovs if you're lucky – but then again 'e ain't got much choice. I couldn't work for a week after. God knows what state that six-year-old was in when he'd done wiv 'er. Poor little cow.'

She lifted her head, defiant. ‘So now you know – who 'e is and what 'e done. So my question is, will it 'elp? 'Elp find whoever it was did them terrible things to Liz?'