Savage Magic (30 page)

The first room off the cellar contains nothing of immediate interest. It is easy to get into – he secures two knives from a drawer in the main kitchen, and after half-a-minute of manipulation the simple old lock gives way and the door opens. He has always been able to get into locked doors, normally without even damaging the mechanism. He learned the trick as a boy in Margate, where the back streets were almost heaving with locked doors behind which smuggled goods swelled in barrels and crates. Fully a quarter of all the boys in Margate could navigate their way past any lock; it was fear of the terrible smugglers that stopped them, in most cases, not the mechanical barrier. And when they did force their way in, it was vital that the door remain unscathed, lest their incursion be discovered.

After passing his candle over the first room’s unsurprising, and uninteresting, contents – flour, vegetables, fruit, a barrel of salted meat, a dozen loaves of sugar – he decides the room will yield no information. He backs out, and locks the door behind him, and turns his attention to the second door.

Almost immediately he senses this incursion will be more fruitful. The lock, for one thing, has been changed, and pretty recently, too. He puts his finger into the keyhole and feels fresh grease inside. Mrs Graham had mentioned no such thing, and there may well be no reason why she would have done. But he rather suspects Mrs Graham’s keys no longer work in this particular door.

The lock yields a little more reluctantly than its companion, but eventually the door does fall open. Taking up his candle, he walks into the unlit interior.

At first sight, all is much the same; jars and barrels and crates of foodstuffs line shelves. But along the far wall is a bench with a sink within it, suggesting this room would normally be a more common part of the kitchen than the locked door now implies. He walks over to the bench, and finds a gas lamp sitting upon it. He lights the lamp from the candle in his hand, and Stephen Moore’s little laboratory opens itself to the light.

He does not recognise it as such immediately, but after a minute or two of gazing he comes to the inevitable conclusion. A dozen large bottles of liquid – some clear, some opaque – line a shelf alongside one end of the bench. The labels upon them are written in Latin, or sometimes in French. He recognises none of the words. A pestle and mortar sits, clean and smelling of nothing in particular, beside these bottles. Several books sit on top of one another on the other side of the bench; Horton opens the top one. It is a herbal, apparently in German, richly decorated on every page with colourful illustrations of plants.

He flicks through the other volumes: an edition of Linnaeus, no less; he recalls a conversation with Abigail about botanical matters. A freshly printed edition of something called
The Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns and Fairies
. An older book, called
The Problems of Aristotle
. A chapbook, a cheap and ugly thing, called
Mother Bridget’s Dream-Book and Oracle of Fate
. Horton recognises none of these books, but he wonders why a ‘cook’ should be consulting them.

He stands for a while at the bench, settling his thoughts, trying to imagine that he was Stephen Moore standing here, consulting these odd dark little books, swirling liquids into one another, gazing by the shadowy light of the gas lamp into alchemical secrets. A hobby, perhaps? Or something a good deal darker?

He hears the urgent sound of a horse approaching up the drive of Thorpe Lee House, breaking his concentration. He puts the books back as he found them, extinguishes the gas lamp, and makes his way out of the gloomy room and back into the kitchen.

The approaching rider is, as expected, William Jealous returning from Stoke d’Abernon. Horton hurries out to meet him before any of the other servants can do so, and Jealous stays in his saddle while Horton reads the note.

Stoke d’Abernon, September 7

To Whom It May Concern

At the request of Patrolman Jealous of Bow Street, to whom this letter is given, I confirm that no one of the name

STEPHEN MOORE has been in the employ of Stoke d’Abernon during my own employment at the House, which encompasses some twenty years.

Watson, P., Butler

‘Is it what you were expecting?’ adds Jealous. Horton can see in the young man’s eyes that he has read the letter. He does not blame him for it. He would do the same.

‘Almost entirely,’ he replies.

BROOKE HOUSE

John Burroway opens the door of Abigail’s cell.

‘Doctor would like to see you, miss.’

She puts down her book on the bed.

‘I have not eaten, John. Not since breakfast. When may I eat?’

He does not answer because, she can see, he does not know. Before yesterday’s events he would speak to her excitedly and with an extraordinarily detailed completeness, every yarn and anecdote spun with the finest thread, with no regard for the attention or patience of his listener. Now, he is silenced. Has Maria done something terrible to him, without knowing?

She stands up and smoothes down her dress. He steps aside for her, and she waits in the corridor beyond for him to lock the door – again, that maddening attention to detail, for there is no one in the cell to be shut inside. He takes his time over the lock, for his hands are shaking. To his left is the closed door of Maria’s cell, from where he’d retrieved Abigail the night before, his hands shaking even more than they are now, his eyes on the floor, avoiding Maria’s gaze like a dog terrified of punishment.

Again, Abigail worries what Maria may have done to John’s mind, as she follows him down the stairs. She shivers as she passes the door to Bryson’s apartment, in that part of Brooke House which the attendants call the Cottage. Her skin is still alive to the disgusting memory of the dinner she’d shared with him. But they are not going to Bryson’s apartments. They walk on down the corridor, towards the front entrance to Brooke House, and John opens the door to Bryson’s consulting chamber. She turns her head to the floor, and goes inside and sits in the nearest chair she can find, not once looking up.

She is terribly, terribly afraid.

She will not look at him, even when he speaks.

‘Mrs Horton, I owe you a sincere apology.’

The words are kind, as is the tone. And yet she still does not look at him.

‘I have treated you terribly, and have in addition behaved like the worst kind of St James roué. Please forgive me.’

She glances up, then, disgusted with herself for being so afraid, disgusted with him for what has passed between them, and she sees the little smile on his face and looks down again, suppressing the urge to stand and drive the letter-knife he holds in his hands into his leering eyes.

What is wrong with me?

She holds her hands, left in right, right in left. To stop them shaking.

If he stands I shall scream.

‘I need your help, Mrs Horton. Your help with Maria. I have given it much thought. And I believe she is the most extraordinary specimen I have ever come across.’

At the word
specimen
her shakes come to a sudden stop. She places her hands on her lap, and looks up at him, head on one side.

Well, then.

‘We need to talk to her, Mrs Horton.’

He sits at his desk. The letter-knife held between his fingers spins in the light from a gas lamp. He is smiling. Of all things he is smiling. The vengeful, angry, spiteful creature she’d expected is not in the room. She thinks of an expression of her mother’s.
He looks like a cat that swallowed a canary
.

‘I have not eaten, Bryson.’

The deletion of his honorific causes that self-satisfied smile to falter somewhat, but it soon comes back.

‘No, that is an oversight. I will arrange for food to be sent to you.’

‘So I am still to be locked in my cell, am I?’

‘By no means. You are to sit with Maria again, Mrs Horton.’

Am I, indeed?

‘To what end?’

‘To calm her. To soothe her. To make her realise that this place, of all the places she could be, is best suited to her.’

‘I am to convince her of this?’

‘No, I do not think convincing will do much good, do you?’

His smile now says he knows a good deal more than he once did. That he has some understanding. Still the subject of what took place in Maria’s cell the day before is not mentioned explicitly. It is a huge creature – an elephant, perhaps – that sits in the room beside them, about which neither is allowed to talk.

‘May I write to my husband?’

The knife catches the light, causing her to blink.

‘Perhaps tomorrow.’

Well, then.

THORPE

Horton must find Moore, immediately and before he can speak to anyone else of what he has learned. Telling Crowley or Mrs Chesterton will certainly lead to Moore’s immediate dismissal; to his being thrown from the house. Sarah Graham has implied that the cook may soon be departing in any case. But Horton would know more of that strange little collection of jars and jugs and liquids before any such action is taken.

The problem is, no one knows where Moore is. It is by now mid-afternoon, and surely he must return soon? Horton finds himself loitering at the bottom of the main staircase, when he hears a bark from the library. It is Sir Henry. He would speak to the constable now, it appears.

Sir Henry is reclining on a splendid chaise longue which has been placed before the window facing the lawn from the library. He makes no effort to rise from his prone position as Horton walks into the room. He does not look up at the constable. Only a waved hand and a grunt acknowledges Horton’s presence. The hand returns to its place against Sir Henry’s chin, as he ponders the view outside. He looks rather as if someone were coming to do his portrait – a very different portrait to the active huntsman that hangs on the far wall.
Sir Henry Tempest, Composing Poetry by the Window
.

Horton clears his throat (wondering, as he does so, when he began this servile affectation), and begins.

‘Sir Henry, Mr Graham has asked me to discuss with you some matters relating to events in London.’

Sir Henry breathes in through his nose, slowly and deliberately, but otherwise makes no response.

‘I believe you have already been told of the deaths of two gentlemen, who, it is thought, you may have some acquaintance with.’

‘Oh, stop it, Horton. Stop talking like a bloody politician.’

Sir Henry speaks mildly, and still doesn’t look at Horton.

‘Well, then, sir. Did you know the two gentlemen?’

‘Yes, I knew them. Of course I knew them. You bloody well know I knew them.’

‘And will you confirm your membership of this society to which they both also belonged? The Sybarites?’

‘It’s not a
society
, Horton. It’s not even a club. We have organised some parties under that name. There is nothing more to it than that.’

‘And you were at the most recent party?’

‘Yes.’

‘Where and when did that take place?’

‘You are not as well informed as you sometimes suggest, constable.’

‘Perhaps not, sir. But I have been here at Thorpe Lee House while events have unfolded.’

‘The most recent party was at Sir John’s residence on the Royal Terrace. It was a matter of a few days ago. The fourth of the month, I believe.’

‘How many attended the party?’

‘
Attended?
There were perhaps ten of us there.’

‘Servants, as well.’

‘Of course.’

‘And . . . women.’

Now Sir Henry does turn to look at Horton, and the poetic aspect of his repose is broken. He now looks like what he is: a fat, middle-aged man lying down on a scruffy sofa, leering at the impertinence of an inferior.

‘We ate. We drank. We fucked. Will that do?’

He turns away again, a hard smile on his soft face. The spat-out syllables bristle the air like the pikes of infantrymen.