The Devil's Breath (13 page)

T
he following morning, as Thomas had hoped, the fog had lifted even more, although a mist, and the stench, still persisted. There were reports that all was clear just south of Oxford, so Lovelock made the carriage ready. Eliza had packed all the necessary baggage for a short sojourn in London and was to accompany her mistress. Lydia had told Thomas of Agnes’s employment and their search would begin at her last known address in Seymour Street.

Dr. Carruthers could hardly contain his excitement when, twelve hours later, Thomas, Lydia, and Eliza arrived at Hollen Street. Their visit was unannounced and Mistress Finesilver was most vexed. It was after nine o’clock and, with no prior warning of the visit, nothing had been put in place. The housekeeper complained that she would have to make up beds that had not been slept in for at least two years and that, through no fault of her own, the mattresses would not be aired. Worse still, she only had a pie and some broth to offer her guests.

Nevertheless, despite the odd acerbic comment from Mistress Finesilver, they were able to enjoy a passable dinner. Afterward, while Lydia retired upstairs to bed, Thomas remained in the drawing room with his mentor. He filled pipes for both of them and they sat in chairs on either side of an empty hearth.

The old anatomist had heard reports of the great cloud in the newssheets and was fully aware of the havoc it was spreading. “So, I’m assuming you found a way of analyzing the nature of this fog,” said Dr. Carruthers, fingering the bowl of his pipe.

“Indeed,” replied Thomas, adding wryly: “I was taught well.”

“And?”

“And it contains sulfur, both in acid form and in particles.”

Carruthers drew on his pipe. “Interesting,” he said slowly. “But you do not know the source?”

“No, sir, I do not, but I have a theory.” The idea had come to Thomas when he was in the library at Boughton, thumbing through the many volumes he had consulted in his search for a precedent for the noxious fog. He had uncovered an engraving of the destruction of Pompeii in Ancient Roman times and he recalled a similar story from his youth. He explained: “My father told me about a volcano north of my homeland that unleashed a cloud of poisonous gas. It killed many hundreds of native people in the area.”

Dr. Carruthers exhaled and a cloud of smoke billowed from his mouth. “So you think a volcanic eruption has caused this calamity?”

Thomas nodded. “At present that is my inclination.”

“But how can you test this theory?”

The exact same question had been puzzling Thomas for the past few days, but the answer had come to him as their carriage passed along Craven Street. It was there, in a modest town house, that his father’s dear friend Benjamin Franklin had resided while in London. Now living in Paris, where he was America’s first ambassador, Thomas knew that weather conditions were one of his many scientific interests. After all, he had produced treatises on meteorology and ocean currents. He drew heavily on his own pipe. “I shall write to Mr. Franklin,” he said.

“Your compatriot?”

“Yes, sir,” said Thomas. “He is bound to have some view on the matter.”

No one noticed Agnes Appleton slip out of the bawd house that evening. There were too many customers downstairs to see her leaving by the back entrance, heading out into the balmy June night. The bell of St. Martin’s tolled ten o’clock. She did not look back.

The air was full of raucous laughter and fiddle music trilling from the taverns. The audience was spilling out of the theater in Drury Lane, where they had just seen a performance by Mr. Garrick.

She pulled her shawl over her head. She was not looking for custom. Instead, her eyes firmly fixed on the gutter, she made her way along the Strand and down Whitehall. A dray cart veered toward her and the driver cursed her for being in the way. A sedan chair swerved to avoid her. Someone tipped a bowl of greasy water onto the street. It narrowly missed her feet. She began to cry, but she kept on going. Up ahead she could hear drunken men; sailors singing snatches of shanties. They meandered along the path, shouting at her and making lewd gestures. She did not look up, but kept her head down. Not long now. She would soon be there, she told herself.

Minutes later she had reached Westminster Bridge. Looking over the parapet she saw the moon reflected like a great silver coin in the choppy water. A cooling breeze blew along the river and made her shiver. A few passengers waited on the stairs below. A half-dozen ferry boats were crisscrossing the Thames, struggling against the turning tide. The rushing water lapped around the piers.

From somewhere in the blackness a man’s voice called out. A bell struck the hour; she was not sure which. She did not care. A moment later a woman screamed. Then there came a heavy splash and the chill waters of the river closed over the girl’s head.

T
he notary had spent a second night in London. His task was not proving as straightforward as he might have hoped and now he found himself having to venture farther into the realms of unspeakable poverty and deprivation to which he was certainly unaccustomed. He had visited Faulks’s premises and been told he would find the proprietor and his boys at the dust yard toward the river. Rather than wait for him to return, he decided it was best not to prevaricate. He was fully aware that there could be an unpleasant scene and he wanted to see his business over and done with. The sooner he did, the sooner he could return to Oxfordshire.

The first odd thing he noticed just before he reached the yard was the sight of gulls circling overhead. But these voracious birds were not after fish, as the notary soon discovered. They were attracted by catches of a much less romantic variety—of animal entrails and kitchen scrapings. They dived, picked, and soared overhead, clutching their prizes in their beaks, screeching gleefully as they did so. He was glad that he had invested in a fresh nosegay that morning and he held it under his nose and breathed in deeply.

Piles of discarded rubbish shaped the landscape of the yard with hillocks and cones. As far as he could guess, it was an area of about two hundred feet wide and half as long and opened onto the Thames beyond. Flanking one side of the yard were a dozen or so upturned dustcarts.

Women and girls crawled like ants on two or three of the mounds. Some of them sat holding sieves as large as the top of a small loo table, and were catching huge shovelfuls from a feeder. Others simply raked the rubbish with their bare hands. Some of them sang as they worked, their voices drowning the constant drone of the flies on the heaps.

On the other side of the yard were more mounds. These were different in nature; gray and black and smooth. Even though there was hardly any breeze, as he approached fine ashes floated like snowflakes in the air. As he sniffed at his nosegay, he watched half a dozen men and boys emptying sacks onto the piles. They reminded him of black beetles on a dung heap. Gingerly, he picked his way over to them, zigzagging between potholes and pools of stagnant water.

As he drew nearer, he observed that these mounds, too, were particular in their nature. One pile, about the height of two men, consisted of cinders, ashes, and other emptyings from dust-holes and bins, while another by its side was made up of fine dark powder. There were several young boys, again with large sieves, who were working their way through the bulging mound, as if panning for gold. They discarded the chunks and lumps they found and their sievings fell onto another pile. This, he assumed, was refined soot which, he had heard, was much in demand by farmers who would use it to preserve wheat and turnips.

By the mound stood a stocky man in a ragged black coat.

“Mr. Faulks?” called the notary.

The man turned. He seemed to have met with an accident and one eye was covered with an oyster shell through which he had threaded a string that secured it around his head. The notary had been told that this was his distinguishing mark.

“I go by that name, sir,” replied the man in a surly fashion.

“Then I am hoping you can help me,” replied the notary, a little out of breath. “I am looking for a young boy. I believe he is apprenticed to you.” He nodded in the direction of the nearest pile. He could see now that there were about three or four boys emptying sacks of soot, but one of them was much smaller than the rest. He struggled more than the others as they stumbled up the slope, each with a burden on their backs. His right arm seemed to dangle helplessly at his side.

“Got into trouble, eh?” he growled. “I’ll flail the . . .”

“No,” interrupted the notary. “No, there is no trouble,” he soothed. “The boy I seek goes by the name of Richard Farrell, although you may know him as Richard Crick.”

Faulks nodded, narrowing the one eye that could be seen.

“Young Crick, yes, that’s him,” he said, pointing to the small child. “Him with the arm. I should never have taken him on, but his keeper, a pretty lass, persuaded me, if you get my drift.” He laughed and nudged the notary, who remained unimpressed. “Anyway, he can get up the flues all right, he’s that skinny, but he’s slow. Too slow.”

The notary allowed a smile to flutter across his face. “Then might you consider letting him go?”

Faulks snorted. “You’d have to make it worth me while.”

The little man nodded. “I would be very happy to,” he replied.

 

Back at Hollen Street Lydia was waiting for Thomas in the drawing room, staring out of the window. She was already wearing her hat. On hearing footsteps she turned and smiled. She seemed in good spirits and he took advantage of the fact that they were alone. Slipping his arms around her waist, he kissed her lips.

“I am so very nervous,” she whispered.

“I know,” he replied. He felt strangely unsettled, too, but he did not let on. “Whatever the outcome, I’ll always be here for you,” he said softly. He was sounding a note of caution. He knew her hopes of finding Richard were high, but he acknowledged the child was only one of thousands of orphans in the city. The chances of him even being alive were very slim, let alone recovering him in good health.

They set off for the Seymour Street address just as soon as they were able. Eliza accompanied her mistress. For once Thomas was glad to swap the country air of Oxfordshire for the city stench of London. Even though the heat was still too much for most, it was preferable to the noxious miasma and he was glad to see the sun again after almost two weeks of thick fog at Boughton.

Traveling west, the streets became wider and cleaner and soon the carriage stopped outside the neat town house from where Agnes Appleton had sent her last letter to her sister. Lydia craned her neck from the inside of the carriage to look at the tall facade. A faint smile skidded across her features at the thought of her son living in this district. Francis had done well to rescue him from the workhouse and place him here, she told herself. Had he done it for love of her, or because he wanted to use Richard as a sort of bargaining tool to win her hand? She would never know.

Thomas alighted first and went to pull the bell. The door was answered by a cheerful freckled maid. The young doctor bowed.

“Good day, Miss,” he began. “I am making inquiries about a gentleman who I believe used to lodge here. His name was the Right Honorable Francis Crick.”

Any vestige of a smile quickly disappeared from the girl’s face.

“The mistress says she don’t want no trouble,” she snapped. “I am to tell any others who come calling about the boy to go away.” And with that, she began to close the door.

It was immediately clear to Thomas that once again they were following in the footsteps of someone else who was searching for the Crick heir. He knew he had to act quickly.

“Please tell your mistress I am sorry to have troubled her,” Thomas said, smiling. “We mean no harm,” he insisted. Then, turning toward the carriage, he gestured to Lydia. “We are merely seeking a young woman by the name of Agnes Appleton, who was nursemaid to a small boy.”

At the mention of Agnes’s name, the maid’s scowl softened and her eyes widened. Her gaze set on Thomas. “Agnes?” she repeated.

Just then, however, a harsh voice called from within the house.

“Who’s there, Maddie?”

The maid became flustered. “No one,” she retorted. “A hawker, ma’am,” and she began to close the door once more. But just before it shut completely, she stuck her freckled face over the threshold. “Meet me at the Oxford Chapel tonight. Ten o’clock,” she whispered. And with those words she retreated and banged the door shut.

Back in the carriage Thomas related the exchange with the maid. “She knows something,” he told Lydia and Eliza. “We are to meet this evening.”

“What did she say?” pressed an eager Lydia.

“Very little,” replied Thomas. “She had been told to stay silent. What I do know is that, yet again, someone has been here before us and paid for silence.”

“But what of the maid, sir?” urged Eliza.

Thomas nodded. “ ’Tis clear to me that she knew Agnes. She will be forthcoming, of that I am sure.”

Lydia took a deep breath and squeezed Eliza’s hand. “So perhaps we can finally start to make progress?” she said excitedly.

“Perhaps,” replied Thomas. He did not like to tell her he had a nagging suspicion that what the maid had to relate would not be good news.

 

The carriage turned down Whitehall and followed the river for a few hundred yards, past Westminster Bridge. Thomas was staring out of the window, looking at the ferries ply their trade across the Thames, when he spotted a small crowd gathered on a landing stage. At first he thought they were merely passengers queuing for a ferry at Whitehall Stairs, but then he noticed some women seemed agitated. Several people were leaning over, looking into a ferry that had just moored up, and a man was shouting and waving his arms excitedly.

Thomas leaned out of the carriage and called for the driver to pull up.

“What is it?” asked Lydia.

“Over there,” said Thomas, pointing to the group. “They may need a physician.”

As soon as the carriage came to a halt, he jumped out and hurried along the boardwalk over to where the small crowd was gathered. A dozen or so people were clustered around a ferryman. In his arms lay a young woman. Her body was limp. She was fully clothed and dripping wet and there was green weed in her long, dark hair. It was clear she had just been pulled from the water. A thin trickle of foam seeped from her mouth. Thomas ordered the ferryman to lay her down on the jetty and he felt her neck for a pulse. There was nothing. He pressed on her chest and more foam appeared from her mouth, but it was immediately evident to Thomas she had been dead some hours.

“Does anyone know who she is?” he asked, looking up and into the crowd. No one answered. Instead, they began to disperse with eyes lowered. She was just another girl; a servant or maybe even a harlot from her low-cut bodice. There was at least one most nights, found washed up on the stinking shoreline the next day.

In his concern for the drowned woman, Thomas had forgotten about Lydia and Eliza. He looked up to see them both approaching. Scrambling to his feet once more, he waved Lydia back, but she lifted her skirts and picked her way toward him. The crowd was thinning as she drew closer and she caught a glimpse of the dead girl’s face. She grimaced and turned her head away almost immediately. Eliza had been following just a few paces behind. She, too, saw the girl, lying prostrate on the boardwalk, her dark hair pulled back off her forehead by the weight of water. Only she did not grimace and turn away. She stared at her in horror before letting out a terrible wail.

“No!” she screamed, and she flung herself forward. Cradling the girl’s head in her hands she cried: “Agnes! No!”