Devoured (20 page)

‘What can one say, Professor? I’m troubled, as you must be. Perhaps you have seen such violence before?’

Hatton stared at his empty glass. ‘I’ve seen many things. But today on the Fen, it sickened me. Of course, as a pathologist, I am expected to be inured to these sights. To get my notebook out. To make comments. To delve and decipher. But today, I felt I lost my way a little. There was a boy who helped us. He took a shine to me, if you could call it that. And though he was nothing to me, I felt … oh, I don’t know. Like Inspector Adams said, it’s been a long day.’

‘He felt like your child? Is that what you mean, Professor?’

Hatton ran his hands through his hair and yes, he thought, the boy felt a little like his own child for a second, and he wondered where the boy was now. And although there was barely a taste of the whisky left, he picked up the tumbler and pressed it to his lips, to sip the very last drop. The bar was closed. Last orders had already been called.

‘I understand,’ said Broderig. ‘There was a boy I met in Borneo, and if I ever marry, I should like a lad like that. A strong boy, who can look after himself. I gave the boy my gun before I left. I am no lover of weapons, but in the jungle they’re only tools, I suppose.’ Hatton watched the young man’s face in the gloom cloud a little. ‘I need the letters back, Professor. There are details in them which might be misconstrued, taken out of context, cause trouble.’

Hatton shifted on his seat. ‘Cause trouble for whom?’

‘Something happened, Professor. I cannot say what. I told Katherine, and she forgave me. It’s all over and done with now and I’m only twenty-five. I have my whole life ahead of me.’

Hatton smiled wearily, not wanting to press Broderig on something which was clearly a private matter. When it came to women, he’d had his fair share of youthful misdemeanours, which were best left in the past. And so he stood up and left Broderig idly shifting chess pieces and went to his bed, which was perfectly comfortable; a little garret room, not unlike the room he had as a child in Hampshire.

Hatton sat on an arched-back chair, which had been positioned by the window, and heard a dog bark and some drunk fellows laughing outside, but they quickly moved away and it was soon silent.

Hatton moved to his bed, removed his shoes, and lay down. He didn’t want to think about the case any more. He wanted to think about other things. His own future, for example. To map it out in his head. To contemplate this day, and the next and the next after that, and where this journey called life might take him. He was dog-tired and although he tried to stay awake, the day had taken its toll.

THIRTEEN

 

 

 

Yesterday, Ashby recalled that the Duke of Monreith had seemed preoccupied, all the time looking out of the window, looking for someone or something, his baritone voice replaced by a husky murmur, ‘What did you say, Ashby? Speak up.’ There were no visits to the docks, no checking up on business, even the speech-writing had stopped.

Then, left alone in the office, Ashby had wandered over to a shelf to fetch some ink and, as he turned around, caught sight of the Duke through the mullion window far below on the glistening pavers of Westminster, talking to what looked like two Specials. They wore no uniform, but Ashby was long enough in The Borough to know a policeman when he saw one. They talked to the Duke for a while, shook hands, and then went on their way. The Duke’s giveaway thud back up the stone stairs was recognisable a few minutes later.

‘Have the newspapers arrived yet?’

Ashby quickly located
The Times
from a heap of other journals. The Duke snatched it, went to his armchair, and flicked through cover to cover, then threw it on the floor. ‘Word on the street is that a terrible crime’s been committed. Have you heard anything?’

Ashby said nothing but continued with his work. The Duke seemed to stumble a little. He got up, paced the room, and wrung his hands. ‘A cold-blooded murder in Millford Lane. Mr Dodds, the Purveyor of Fine Books. And I went there only the other day. Apparently he was pinned like a moth to the floor of his shop. Do you remember the place, Ashby?’

Ashby said, ‘Yes, sir. You dropped me on The Strand, I recall.’

‘It was your fault, Ashby.’

‘I’m sorry, sir?’

‘I said it was your fault. I wanted the Hooker paper. But you failed to secure it, so I had to go there myself. Do you remember?’

Ashby’s head hurt. Yes, he remembered, but he was muddled.

‘Well, any questions along those lines, from anybody snooping around, you keep your mouth shut, d’ya hear? Fucking botanicals. Another one dead, they said. What of it? I never went there. Understood?’

Then, for some reason, the Duke of Monreith mellowed and did something he’d never done before. He lay a trembling hand on the old man’s shoulders. ‘But sometimes things have a way of turning out well, do they not? But I was never at the bookshop, Mr Ashby,  understood?’

Ashby shook his head at the Duke’s words. ‘
I was never there, understood
?’ But other voices were calling him today. He staggered from his bed, opened his secretaire, and took the letters out again, untying the bright blue ribbon. A rank smell rose in the air from the flesh-coloured paper, the ‘M’ taunting him. He didn’t want to read the words, but the pleading was explicit, the voices begging.

It was still dark outside, but the other tenants downstairs were long up, and Ashby heard clearly the whack of a child, the shout of ‘You little wretch,’ and a howl. The trouble with the poor, thought Ashby, was that they had too many children. They could look after one or two, but they had eight, nine, ten. There were just so damn many of them. Still, there were ways to curb this sprawling population.

Like vermin they were, the Duke had said, at one of his many private gatherings some months gone now. Bred like rabbits, he’d said. And they were eaters, children. Big eaters. And the more you had, the bigger the eating became. And where did that lead? What was the use of them?

‘Hear, hear,’ said one of the guests.

‘Malthus should be required reading for all leaders of men,’ said another.

‘The poor must be controlled. Or they will burst the seams right open.’

‘And we’ll go the way of the French,’ said the Duke. ‘And it will be bloody, gentlemen. Heads will roll. It will be anarchy. I for one think the segregation of the genders below stairs is an excellent idea. And children, like women, must be kept occupied.’

Ashby shuddered at the memory and he was still reeling from the vice-like clutches of that blackmailing whore. He looked at his arm in the grey light of dawn, which hung limply from his nightshirt. It was a hard word, whore. But that was what she was. Her fingers had marked him black and blue. He dressed himself slowly and looked at the painting of the old house where his mother had once worked, herself just a child. It hung above his treasured secretaire.

The ruby ring was gone, and if this didn’t stop, the furniture would be next. And then what? There was only one place where a poor old man with no furniture went, and he knew his days were numbered with the Duke. Why, it was as clear as day that he would be discarded soon. His little treasures gone. His bits of china, his French lace, and, most treasured of all, the collection which he showed to no one. Just a peek, he thought.

Not that he would get much for them. He only ever preserved the little creatures. The beetles glistened in their frames and little boxes, polished black onyx. Others green and petrol brilliant, caught, bolt-metal hard, as he had found them. His cataloguing and classification scrolled in delightful calligraphy, just as if he was a real Man of Science.
Cryptocephalus coryli, Clytus arietis.

This skill required precision and, of course, a certain interest in anatomy, for good taxidermy suggested life. Ashby used a little knife for his hobby, the knife that peeled his oranges, and when he looked at his beetles, it made him wistful for a time long past. When he’d been younger, sauntering along the banks of the Thames to far-flung places with country names like Barnes and Twickenham. Each village, a Norman church and a river bend, barge men and fishing folk, dairy maids and meadows. And as summer came, swallows soared overhead, their whistling cries melodic in his ears as he headed west, leaping over stiles and crossing fields on his epic English journey, miles away from London. He smiled lovingly at the little creatures, and then with a sigh, shut them up again in the drawer’s gloomy dark.

His mind was made up. He would pawn nothing else, for surely a man in Monreith’s position with so much to lose would listen. A leader? A parliamentarian? One of the richest men in England? Surely the Duke would see reason.

So Ashby took his coat, left his lodging rooms, and eventually found himself at Monreith House, Number 1, Monreith Square.

It stood, resplendent, a monument to trade, stuffed to the brim with colonial treasures. Once or twice he’d caught a glimpse of the gilded clocks, candlesticks dripping with cherubs, and around every corner, Grecian goddesses, their bronze limbs voluptuous and dark.

Ashby hesitated. Should he go straight in? It was the Sabbath. He paused, then walked to the corner of the road and caught sight of a throng of happy children, who were laughing and throwing snowballs at one another. One lad had his sister on a sledge and was pulling her along, her apple cheeks bright red and her head thrown back begging, ‘Faster, faster!’ Ashby smiled, touched by it all. By the freedom of the snow which had fallen fresh in the night. Perhaps he should just go home, he thought.

But then he saw Monreith, accompanied by a bevy of liveried servants, ready to set off somewhere. And though Ashby’s eyes were dimming, he could see there was someone else already in the carriage. A red-furred bonnet and a svelte-like figure, which greeted the Duke and put tapering arms around him. It was Madame Martineau.

So Ashby decided to follow them and hailed his own coach. ‘Where to, old man?’ asked the driver.

Ashby put his finger to his lips. ‘Follow that barouche, but hang back a bit.’

‘Whatever you say, sir.’

The barouche set off. It headed to The Strand. The hansom followed. The barouche slowed and took a left where part of the road was cordoned off and outside the bookshop was a sign which said
Metropolitan Police / Keep Out
. The barouche sped up, passing the bookseller’s on Millford Lane, not stopping, but heading due south.

Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens had seen better days before the turnstiles dropped the price and let the riff-raff in. Ashby had never been here in its halcyon days, but had heard that the entire Battle of Waterloo had been played out, by a cast of thousands. Men, officers all, resplendent in glinting uniforms, had charged as if to their deaths. Ladies dressed in furs had screamed and fainted at the crack of the guns and the gallop of the horses. But those days were long gone. The champagne dried up. The fireworks spent and fizzled. The throngs of happy couples, rich and cultured, vanished.

The gardens now offered a different sort of entertainment. For amongst the rubbish, the old bottles of spent beer and scattered whelk shells, moved shadows. Ashby paid the driver, skulked in, but hung back from the couple up ahead. Shadows stepped out and spoke to him.

‘Got a nice one here, old man. Ain’t she lovely? She’s yours. Go on … you know you want to.’

‘Penny for your thoughts, ducky. You remind me of my father. It’s Amy. You remember. Cold, ain’t it? A shilling says I’ll make you warm.’

Blocking out the voices, Ashby followed the Duke and the swish of Madame Martineau. It was cold in the gardens but he was shielded by the fog, made invisible. He waited for what? He wasn’t sure.

The Duke and dressmaker were still in Ashby’s sight but only just, and at that moment, thick clouds shuddered across the sky. Ashby shivered as the two figures stayed ahead of him, motionless. Madam Martineau brought a gloved hand out and gave the Duke something. Monreith took it quickly. A scroll of letters, golden parchment tied with rattan. Hand met hand as the pair become a form, transmuted by fog and soft pelting snow. Movement, payment, and whispering as Monreith pushed the weathered scroll deep inside his pocket.

Ashby waited. He watched the pair move back towards the turnstile. They seem distracted. They seemed to be looking for something. And then he saw all that he feared.

Because another shadow had moved towards the Duke, and as Ashby’s eyes adjusted, it morphed into a filthy old hag who seemed to know this pair. Madame Martineau was welcoming, nodding, agreeing, and the old woman was leading a little thing dressed like a ballet-girl. Curly locks, a satin frock, a tad ragged. She had a hoop. She must have been freezing. Ashby strained to hear what was being said but held back, tucked tight within the grasp of a sycamore. But the words muffled in Ashby’s ears, mixing with the scrawls he’d seen on those flesh-coloured sheets, embossed with an M and tied with a bright-blue ribbon now buried in his secretaire. The words were humps and mounds. The words were lips and tongues.