The Color of Death (17 page)

So it seemed that the household staff had discussed the matter in detail amongst themselves. That, I feared, could be dangerous to Maude Bleeker, and perhaps to Crocker as well.

“You were standing quite close to him, I take it.”

“Close enough to reco’nize him. Near as close as I am to you right now.”

“Do you suppose you were close enough that he might have recognized you?”

She took that under consideration. I could do naught but wait. At last she did shake her head indicating the negative. “No,” said she, “there was no sign of reco’nition from him. I doubt he even saw me, though I was right in front of him. Even if he had …” She lowered her gaze. “I’m much stouter than I was twelve years ago. Two or three stone can make a great difference in a person’s appearance.”

“Even so,” said I, “it would be wrong to bandy his name about.

Indeed, I would not discuss it further with members of the staff. The robbers have murdered once, you know.”

That ended my interrogation, such as it was. I told her that I, or perhaps Sir John, might return to ask more questions of her. Or, on the other hand, she might be invited to Bow Street.

Yet there was something more. I spoke up just as she was leaving, and she turned back to me in the doorway to the pantry.

“May I ask one last question?”

“Ask it,” said she.

“You may have helped us considerably in the investigation with what you’ve told me,” said I. “Why did you do it?”

“I ain’t thought about that too much,” said she. “But it seemed like the only thing to do. When I heard what Johnny had done — all the stealing, and now the killing — well, I didn’t see how I could hold nothing back.”

“Thank you,” said I, “but do be careful.”

I was let out the back door, five steps up from the kitchen to the garden. To me it was apparent that Maude’s friends wished to keep Mr. Collier ignorant of my comings and goings. They were suspicious of him. Perhaps I should have been, too, but that afternoon I had spent in his company was sufficient to convince me that he was no real danger to me or to any of the staff. He seemed at worst simply a nosey old fellow of forty: envious, fearful, ineffectual. Wrong he may have been to make such unseemly haste in applying for Arthur s position, but I knew him to be desperate, despite the bold words he had spoken when last we had met. He knew no other way of earning his bread except butlering, and so when the opportunity came, he grabbed for it, not giving damn-all for Arthur, nor for anyone else. I supposed that I could not greatly blame him for it.

Marching on to Mr. Bilbo’s residence in St. James Street, I reviewed my purpose in going there. Deep down, I felt I had been sent by Sir John on a fool’s errand. If Bunkins and the coachmen were certain to lie to me, what then was the purpose of asking them at all about Mr. Burnham’s activities the night before? According to Sir John, by closely examining their lies we might reach the truth. That seemed a dubious premise to me.

I allowed myself these rebellious thoughts, for I felt that my questioning of Maude Bleeker had yielded the most important facts yet uncovered in the investigation. I was quite filled with my own success as an interrogator, never considering that I hardly had any right to claim it. After all, I had been sent by the porter to hear what she had to say, had I not? It had been her wish to tell me what she had experienced, and what she had seen, was it not? And why had I been summoned, why had I been told so much? I had sense enough not to believe the reason she had given. It was far less likely that she should have been prompted by that great list of crimes of which he had presumably been guilty, than that she was inspired by a desire for revenge against her betrayer. Yet, whatever her motive, she had made us a great gift. That was the truth of it; nevertheless, I had convinced myself that I had drawn the information from her most cleverly, that I had managed somehow to trick it out of her.

And so did I come to that house in St. James Street, which I had known by an odd set of circumstances* since my first days in London. I hopped up the three steps to the oaken door, as beautifully paneled as any in St. James, grasped the heavy knocker, and rapped four times. Waiting, I heard steps beyond the door; then they ceased, but contrary to my expectations, the door did not swing open. Still I waited. I rapped again and again, and again heard the shuffle of feet on the other side.

*These circumstances are described in the first of my memoirs of the investigations of Sir John Fielding, which was titled Blind Justice.

Then came a cry of annoyance: “Awright, awright, give me but a moment, and I’ll have the door open. I’m puttin’ on m’hat.” The voice was female, and again there was something about it which suggested I should know its owner. No, it was not Nancy Plummer, nor did I believe it was Mr. Bilbo’s cook. Had he taken a new paramour?

At last the heavy door moved, ever so slowly at first, then more swiftly until a young lady of about twenty was revealed; she was dressed for the street.

“Who are you, and who do you wish to see?” She blurted it forth breathlessly and quite indifferently. Yet she took note of me of a sudden, as I did of her. She stared, and I stared back.

“I knows you,” said she, frowning. “You’re … you’re …”

“And you,” said I, “you’re — now I have it. You’re Mistress Pinkham.”

“So I am. And you’re the lad was with the Blind Beak when he asked me all those questions, ain’t you?”

“Why, indeed I am. Jeremy Proctor is my name. Sir John and I were both most indignant when we heard that Lord Lilley had discharged you, along with the butler. Sir John particularly requested that no action against you be taken until he had the opportunity to talk with you again.”

“Lot of good that did.”

“Where have you been? I searched St. James up and down looking for you and Mr. Collier that we might have our talk.”

“Well, I been right here. Nancy Plummer and me been friends for years, we have.”

“Has Mr. Bilbo taken you on here?”

“Onto his household staff, you mean? Oh no, he has so few, and I’m more of a lady’s maid, anyways. I just been stayin’ here in one of the spare beds.”

“I never thought of asking after you here,” I admitted. “I come here so often I was sure I would have heard it from Mr. Burnham or Jimmie Bunkins or from Mr. Bilbo himself.”

“Well, this is where I been. But it ain’t where I’ll be much longer.”

“Oh? How is that?”

“I been looking for employment, and it seems like I found something at last.”

“Excellent, Mistress Pinkham. Would that be in London, or …”

“Cert’ny in London. I couldn’t live long nowhere else,” said she with great certainty. “Might be some stayin’ in a great house in the country, though. Can’t say as I’d mind that.”

“Oh, indeed not!” said I, presenting her with a cheerful smile.

She, for her part, returned the smile. There followed an awkward pause. “I must be going. I’ve an appointment with my new employer,” said she, starting forward, expecting me to step aside.

I held my ground and would not let her round me. “Where may we reach you, Mistress Pinkham? Here? Or perhaps at your new place of employment? We must have that talk, I fear.”

“Well …” She looked left and right, obviously eager to be gone.

“I could meet with you here, or perhaps at your new employer’s. Who is the new master, by the bye?”

“Uh … it ain’t certain yet that I got employment.”

“I’m sorry. I must have misunderstood,” said I. “But where would that be? Where will you be employed — If you are employed?”

She sighed. “Bloomsbury Square.”

“And your employer will be … ? “

“Lord Mansfield.”

“Thank you. I shall be some time here, and I expect that you will be back here long before dinnertime. We shall have our talk when you return.”

She looked at me rather queerly then, as she might if I were a rabbit blocking her path and snarling menacingly when she sought to pass. I, however, made no further move to block her way. I stepped aside and allowed her by; more, I even offered a slight bow as she passed.

Once inside the house, I closed the heavy door after myself. Standing there in the hall, I felt quite like an intruder. I was not there by invitation, nor would I be entirely welcome if my purpose were known. Still, I had a task to perform, and fool’s errand or no, perform it I would as well as I could.

I was near enough to the closed door of the classroom so that I could hear Mr. Burnham’s voice intoning some lesson in geography to Bun-kins. (Where was Van Diemen’s Land? I had no idea.) I would not, could not, interrupt them. It would be best for me to go direct to Mr. Bilbo, in order to inform him of my presence in his house, and state bluntly just why I had come. It would not do to go tiptoeing about the house, asking questions behind his back. Thus, having made a firm decision, I set off down the long hall to look for Mr. Bilbo where he most likely would be found.

What had been the library in Lord Goodhope’s day was now Black Jack Bilbo’s study. Because he had been a seafaring man, the place was handsomely decorated with seascapes, paintings of ships in harbor, and pictures of exotic locations. In one corner was a maritime compass, and standing beneath the room’s high windows stood a ship’s helm. There were maps on the walls, and all manner of keepsakes — pistols, shells, arrowheads — scattered on shelves that had previously contained Lord Goodhope’s books. If Sir John’s retreat between the bedrooms was a bit small to be called a study, then Mr. Bilbo’s was a bit too large. Yet that fitted the man well. He was in every way a large figure — in every way, that is, except measureable height. Though not a tall man, he was deep-chested and great-bellied; each of his thighs would have matched the size of an ordinary man’s waist; his beard was big and black; and his heart was as large as that of any man in London.

I had but to knock upon the door frame and stick my head within to be waved forward.

“Jeremy, me boy, come in, won’t you?”

I came inside and took the chair opposite his desk, which he pointed to rather grandly (he was also fond of large gestures).

“Always happy to see you,” said he to me, “though I can’t say that this visit is entirely unexpected.”

“Mr. Burnham told you what came to pass during his interview with Sir John.”

“He did. He told me all about it — or as nearly all as he knew.”

“How that huge fellow marched right in and pointed him out as the leader of the band of robbers?”

“Trezavant is his name, I understand.”

“The coroner of Westminster.”

“Ah!” said Mr. Bilbo, rolling his eyes at the information I had given. “That j why Sir John dared not send him packing.”

“Yes, oh yes,” said I. “Mr. Trezavant is a friend of the Prime Minister’s and was appointed to his position by the Lord Chief Justice.”

“Ah, politics.” He shook his head in dismay. “I understand he’s a near neighbor of ours.”

“That’s right — on Little Jermyn Street.”

“Mr. Burnham suspects you of taking him down that particular street so that fellow Trezavant might get a good look at him and make certain identification.”

I jumped indignantly to my feet. “Why, that’s not true!” My voice was loud, certainly, but under control. “That was pure happenstance. I would never do such a thing, nor would Sir John ever ask me to.”

“That’s what I told him. Sit down, Jeremy. I have a point to make.”

I did as he said. He waited to speak until I was once more situated across the desk from him. He then did lean across it, his big hands clasped before him, his dark eyes staring into mine.

“I told Mr. Burnham that I had known the both of you, Sir John and you, Jeremy, long and well enough to be certain that you would not play such low tricks as he describes. And I tell you now, lad, that I’ve known Mr. Burnham long and well enough to be sure that he would not commit theft and murder, as this man Trezavant says he has. When you do truly know a man, in the way I’ve known him and you and Sir John, then you know what they’re capable of and what they’re not. Black man or white man, I’d take his word for it. But of course if it’s Mr. Burnham’s word against the coroner of Westminster, then that complicates things considerably.”

“There is another complication, Mr. Bilbo.”

“And what is that, lad?”

“Neither Sir John nor I believe that Mr. Burnham is guilty, as Mr. Trezavant charges. Yet, Sir John — and I too, I must confess — does not believe that he spent his time quietly at home last evening, as he says he did. That is why Sir John sent me here to attempt to confirm his story from the comments and testimony of those who were here at the time.”

“To confirm it or put the lie to it?”

“However it turns out, I suppose.” I hesitated at that point, but then decided to be altogether frank with Mr. Bilbo. “Sir John expects that I shall be lied to, but he says that even the lies may be of some value, for they may lead us to the truth. I have yet to divine how this may be so.”

“He’s a clever one, ain’t he? Only he could devise a way how lies would lead to the truth.” He laughed at that, clapped his hands, and laughed some more. Then the laughter suddenly stopped. “But let me tell you, Jeremy,” said he, “Sir John was dead right about one thing, and that’s that you’ll be lied to. In fact, I’ll tell you now that I stayed less than an hour at my gaming club, and all the time I was here — that is, up to about 10:30 — Mr. Burnham was also here, and I’m absolutely sure of it.”

“Is that the truth, Mr. Bilbo?”

“I’m willing to swear to it, Jeremy.”

And that was not at all, in this instance, the same as telling the truth.

“It would be my word against Mr. Trezavant’s, and though I’m a gambler, there’s many a duke and earl willing to swear that I run the finest and most honest gaming club in all London. They wouldn’t keep coming to me if it were not so.”

With a nod of his head, he indicated that there was nothing more to say.

I rose from my chair. “Then I have your permission to talk to all who were about your residence last night?”

“Of course,” said he. “You never need my permission to come into this house and talk with anyone.”