A Sunless Sea (27 page)

But then many women believed they had love. Maybe even Dinah Lambourn.

She looked at Gladys again. She was sitting with her brow furrowed, a look of deep concentration on her face.

Hester waited.

Gladys looked up at last. “Mebbe. Don’t really matter,” she said slowly. “It were terrible wot ’appened to ’er. I don’t care wot she done, that weren’t right.”

Hester was not sure what to say. “Did she do something so bad?” she asked. She was afraid she would drive Gladys back into silence, but she was increasingly conscious that the other woman knew more than she had said.

“That’s it,” Gladys bit her lip. “She were kind o’ secretive, sometimes a bit la-di-da, like she were better’n the rest of us, but she were kind, in ’er own way. She acted like she’d come down in the world, but I thought that mebbe she ’ad. Something she said once. Tillie Biggs were drunk ’alf out of ’er mind. Lyin’ in the gutter like it were the only place left for
’er. Couldn’t fall out of it, likely. An’ Zenia were the only one wot ’ad time ter pick ’er up. Rest of us said the stupid cow brought it on ’erself, but Zenia wouldn’t ’ave it. Said we all brought things on ourselves, don’t mean we didn’t need ’elpin’.”

“What did she do?” Hester felt a tightening in her throat, the beginning of an emotion she could not control.

Gladys made a small, sad gesture. “ ’Eaved ’er up an’ dragged ’er into an alley doorway where it were dry, an’ nobody’d fall over ’er. Propped ’er up there, an’ left ’er. In’t nothin’ else yer can do. She knew that.” She stopped, struggling with whether to say more.

Hester did not know whether to encourage her or not. She drew in her breath to speak, then changed her mind.

“Reckon as maybe she’d fallen in a few gullies ’erself,” Gladys said quietly. “She told me once that she’d bin married. Mebbe ’e left ’er ’cos o’ the drink. Or she left ’im. Dunno.” She shook her head. “But she weren’t one o’ us, like from round ’ere.”

“Where did she come from, do you know?” Hester asked gently. Gladys’s answers had made Zenia far too real: a woman with dreams and sudden kindnesses, capable of feeling grief and pain.

“She never said. She were an odd one. Liked flowers. I mean she knew ’ow ter grow ’em, wot kind o’ soil they liked, that sort o’ thing, ’cos she used ter talk about it sometimes. Wot month they was out, an’ the like. Don’ get no flowers round ’ere. She used ter stand on the pier sometimes an’ look over the water, like mebbe she were from south o’ the river.” She shrugged. “Could a’ bin just ter be by ’erself, like; think a bit. Dream as yer could get on one o’ them boats an’ go somewhere. I think that, sometimes.”

Again Hester waited before she broke the moment.

Gladys looked up at her and smiled a little self-consciously. “Daft, eh?”

“No,” Hester replied. “We all need to dream of things, now and then. Who else knew her? What was Dr. Lambourn like? Did she ever talk about him?”

“No. But then I reckoned as she knew ’e were worth keepin’ for ’erself, like. Couldn’t share nothin’. Weren’t enough to go round.”

“Jealous?” Hester said quickly.

“Course we was, but Gawd, we wouldn’t do that ter nobody! Wot the bleedin’ ’ell d’yer think we are?” Gladys was indignant, even hurt.

“I didn’t think so,” Hester retracted. She really did not know what to ask next. Since finding Gladys and talking to her, she began to believe that perhaps Dinah had lost her sanity, temporarily, and maybe it was she, after all, who had ripped Zenia apart. Could an otherwise normal woman feel so betrayed that she would indulge the darkest, bloodiest side of her nature? Had the wounds been so deep—failure, self-disgust, hatred—that they drove her beyond sanity?

It no longer seemed unimaginable.

She changed the subject. “The shopkeeper said Mrs. Lambourn came to Limehouse looking for opium. Dr. Lambourn did, too, didn’t he? Asking questions, I mean.”

“I ’eard. ’E never asked me, but ’ow would I know anything?”

“Did you meet him?”

“Yeah, couple o’ times. I told yer, ’e were askin’ all sorts o’ things o’ people.”

“About opium?”

“Yeah. ’E wanted ter find Agony.”

Hester was taken aback. “What?”

“Agony Nisbet. Least I reckon ’er name is really Agatha, or summink like that, but everyone calls ’er Agony, ’cos she ’elps folks wot got real terrible pain.”

“With opium?” Hester said quickly.

“O’ course. You know anything else wot’ll ’elp when pain is that bad?”

“No,” Hester admitted, “I don’t. Did he find her?”

“Dunno. S’pose, ’cos ’e didn’t come back lookin’.”

“What was he like?” She asked more from curiosity than because she thought it would help. And she was not sure what she was trying to gain anymore; she had begun with the idea of finding some explanation for Zenia Gadney’s murder that would prove Dinah innocent. Now her own emotions were disturbed to the depth where she could imagine getting lost in a madness of grief, where acts of violence might be quite possible, and she was no longer certain there
was
another explanation to find.

Could she take that back to Monk, and to Rathbone? Would that be surrender, or just realism?

Gladys gave the characteristic lift of one shoulder again. “Not like I’d ’ave thought,” she said with surprise still lingering in her face. “ ’E were soft-spoken, real gentle. ’E treated me like I were … someone instead of no one. I guess yer can’t always tell about folks, can yer?”

Hester remained a little longer, but Gladys did not know anything more except the places where Hester might begin to look for “Agony” Nisbet. So she thanked her and left.

S
HE SPOKE TO SEVERAL
other people in Copenhagen Place, including the shopkeeper that Monk had visited, and heard his account of Dinah’s visit, which added nothing new to what they already knew.

Then she went out into the cold, gusty thoroughfare. As the eaves dripped on her and people jostled her on the wet footpath, she tried to put herself in Dinah’s shoes. Apparently Dinah had known for years that her husband had visited Zenia Gadney, and paid her. What had happened that had changed her from a compliant wife, tolerating the fact, even agreeing to it, into a woman who had lost all hold on humanity?

If Hester had discovered something like that about Monk, it would have defiled her love for him. But would it have destroyed her own values of compassion and honor?

She might have been hurt beyond bearing. She might have wept herself exhausted, unable to eat or sleep, but if her despair had been complete she would have taken her own life, not someone else’s.

Wouldn’t she?

Was it conceivable that it was Dinah who had actually killed Joel Lambourn? Had either Monk or Rathbone even thought of that, and weighed it without the tangle of emotion her pain caused in them?

But Lambourn’s death had looked like suicide. It was even gentle, with the opium to dull the pain. There was no hatred there, not even any anger. But it robbed Dinah of the respectability, the social status, and most of the income to which she was accustomed. What about Adah and Marianne? Had she even thought of them? Did a woman
ever really forget her children? What had Lambourn left? Enough for them to live on, for Dinah to raise and successfully marry the two young girls?

Was it even physically possible that Dinah had done it alone? Had she lured him up to One Tree Hill in the middle of the night? Persuaded him to take the opium, then sit there while she cut his wrists, calmly picked up the bottle and the knife, and walked back home again to her children? Why take away the bottle and knife? That made no sense. If he had really committed suicide, they would have been there. And the fact that they were from her home wouldn’t need concealing, because it was his home, too!

If she were capable of such cold-blooded planning, why the insane rage in mutilating Zenia Gadney? And what could have provoked her, after years of knowing about the whole arrangement? Why suddenly commit two murders, two months apart?

It made no sense. There had to be another answer.

H
ESTER SPENT THE REST
of the day speaking to people in the area and learning a little more about Zenia Gadney, but nothing that altered the picture Gladys had given her of a quiet, rather sad woman. Apparently she had destroyed her youth with drink, but she also appeared to have beaten whatever demons had driven her then. For the last fifteen years she had lived in Copenhagen Place. She had done the odd job of sewing or mending for people, but more as a friend than for money. It was a way of associating with others, and having the occasional conversation. She appeared to be supported by Dr. Lambourn sufficiently that if she was careful, no other income had been necessary.

Several people said they saw her out walking quite often, in all weathers but the very worst. Most often it was along Narrow Street, beside the river. Sometimes she would stand with the wind in her face, looking south, watching the barges come and go. If you spoke to her she would answer, and she was always agreeable, but she seldom sought conversation herself.

No one spoke ill of her.

Hester went to stand in Narrow Street herself, the wind stinging
her face, gray water glinting in the light. Hester had a strong sense of Zenia’s loneliness, perhaps of the regret that must have crowded her mind so many times. What had started her drinking in the first place? Some domestic tragedy? Perhaps the death of a child? A marriage that was desperately unhappy? Probably no one would ever know.

There seemed to be nothing in Zenia’s life that led to her terrible death, unless it was her association with Joel Lambourn. If it was not that, then she was no more than a chance victim, sacrificed to opportunity and insane rage.

Hester had begun with pity for Dinah, a woman robbed not only of the husband she loved, but, in a sense, of all that she had believed of the happiness in her life. The sweetness of her memories were now tainted forever. Soon she would lose her own life in the awful ritual punishment of hanging.

Now as Hester stood watching the gray water of the river swirl past her, her pity was for Zenia Gadney. The woman’s life had held so little comfort, and in the last decade and a half, almost no warmth of laughter, sharing, even touching another human being, apart from Joel Lambourn once a month, for money. Hester refused to try to picture that in her mind. What could he have wanted that was so strange or so obscene that his wife would not grant it to him, and he paid a sad prostitute in Limehouse instead?

She was glad that she did not need to know.

The water was loud on the shingle as the wash of a boat reached the shore on the low tide. A string of barges passed in midstream, laden with coal, timber, and bales stacked high. The men guiding them balanced with a rough, powerful grace, wielding their long poles. The wind was rising and smelled of salt and rain. Gulls screamed overhead, a long, mournful cry.

Hester felt she had exhausted the subject of Zenia Gadney. She wondered if there was any point in trying to find out more of Dr. Lambourn’s search for information about opium. Probably not. The light was fading and it was getting colder as the tide turned. It was time to go home where it was warm, not just away from the wind off the water, but away from the impressions of death, from rage and despair, and the
hunger that in the end had destroyed everything that was precious for these people.

She would make Scuff something he really liked for supper, and listen to him laugh about something trivial, say good night to him when he was scrubbed and clean, smelling of soap and ready for bed.

Later she would lie with Monk, and thank God for all the things that were good in her world.

I
T TOOK
H
ESTER ALL
the next day, and half the day after to find Agatha Nisbet. She had walked along the narrow path westward, past Greenland Dock and inland to Norway Yard. She asked again in Rotherhithe Street, and it was only a few dozen yards farther to a large, unused warehouse where there was a makeshift clinic for injured dockworkers and sailors.

She went in, walking boldly; head up as if she had the right to be there. One or two people looked at her curiously, first a young woman with a mop and bucket busy scrubbing floors, then a man with blood on his clothes, who appeared to be some kind of orderly. She smiled at him, and he relaxed and did not challenge her.

She passed two or three middle-aged women. They looked tired and harassed, their clothes crumpled as if they had been in them all night as well as all day. They brought back sharp memories of her own hospital days: cleaning, rolling bandages, changing beds, and helping sick and injured people eat, above all taking orders. She remembered the weariness, and the comradeship, the grief shared and the victories.

There were straw palliasses on the floor, all of them occupied by men, pale-faced and dirty, arms, legs, or bodies bandaged. The fortunate ones seemed to be asleep. If Agatha Nisbet had given them opium and bound up their injuries, Hester for one would have no criticism of her. Those who found fault should try a week or two of lying on this floor with bruised and broken bodies, with no ease during the long, bitter hours of the night in the cold and the darkness when even to draw breath was all but unbearable.

She had reached the end of the huge room and was about to knock
on one of the doors of the cubicles at the end when it burst open. She found herself looking up at a woman who was well over six foot tall and with the broad, heavy shoulders of a navvy. Her hair was frizzy and of a fading auburn color. Her features were powerful, and had probably even been handsome thirty years ago in her youth. By now time and hard living had coarsened them, and sun and wind had roughened her skin. Fierce blue eyes regarded Hester with contempt.

“What do you want here, lady?” she asked in a soft, slightly sibilant voice. It was a little high, and did not sound as if it could possibly have come from her enormous body. There was contempt in her use of the word lady.

Hester bit back the tart response she would like to have made.

“Miss Nisbet?” she asked politely.