A Tattooed Heart (44 page)

She turned back to Gil/Clarence's tomb. ‘So, how have you been?'

No answer, but sometimes there wasn't.

‘We've had quite a time of it lately. Well, not so much me, but Friday and Aria certainly have. Bella Shand died. Her house went up in flames, taking her and those two women of hers with it. I heard the fire was so hot they turned into charcoal. You know how I told you she was blackmailing Friday and the girls? Well, Friday insists she had nothing to do with the fire, but she and Aria were both missing the day it happened. What do you think of that? I'm sure she was lying.'

Still Gil said nothing.

‘Not that I care, as long as they don't get found out. She was an evil woman, that Bella Shand. Sorry, Clarence, if you're listening, but she was and you weren't much better.' Elizabeth flapped a fly
away from her face. ‘And then, a couple of weeks ago, that Jonah Leary — the madman who took Harrie's little one, Charlotte? — well, he turned up back in town and there was quite a set-to. He went after Serafina Fortune, attacked Friday — who was in the middle of things
again
— and ended up shooting a constable right in the eye. Killed him, too, so he'll be swinging at the end of a rope before you know it. Good riddance, too. That man's been no end of trouble.'

Elizabeth glanced over her shoulder to make sure no one was within earshot. A family group was retreating along the path, a couple of gardeners were tending a grave some distance away, and the two men hadn't moved.

‘I have to say, though, I did get quite a fright the night Bella died. I heard about it almost as soon as it happened. Hazel had been out for a drink at the Sailor's Return — you know, the tavern halfway along Cumberland Street? — and came home and told me. Mind you, I could see the flames from my window. I did wonder what was on fire. It didn't occur to me till the next day that she might be buried here with Clarence. I nearly died! But they're all in a grave together over in the Episcopals. Apparently Bella was a Papist but her women were Church of England so she got outvoted.' Leaning her elbows on the tomb she lowered her voice. ‘God almighty, Gil, just imagine what would have happened if they had decided to put her in here, and dug him up and found you here as well.'

Gil finally decided to speak. ‘I doubt anyone would recognise me after all these years, love.'

‘They might. You're still wearing the clothes you had on when you died.' Elizabeth frowned. ‘At least, I think you are.'

‘Plenty of men own a cap and a greatcoat.'

‘Yes, but plenty of men aren't buried in someone else's grave with a bloody great hole in their skull from being shot. Sometimes I wish I'd poisoned you instead. I could've passed it off as natural causes.'

‘You always did have a quick temper.'

‘That's rich coming from you. If
you
hadn't been such a foul-tempered drunkard, you wouldn't have ended up dead in a trunk.'

‘I suppose not. I still love you, though, Elizabeth.'

‘And I still love you. I always will.'

A voice said, ‘And you're under arrest for the murder of Gilbert Hislop.'

Her heart almost bursting with shock, she whirled and came face to face with the pair of gardeners.

The taller of the two gripped her forearm, turned her and manacled her hands. ‘We'll be heading up to the police court now, Mrs Hislop, if you will.'

‘Who the hell are you?' she croaked.

‘Constable Morley and Constable Gould, Sydney Police.'

‘No, I . . . You've made a mistake.' But they hadn't, and she saw in their eyes they knew they hadn't. They'd heard what she'd said.

‘Come along now,' Constable Gould said.

‘Have you been
spying
on me?' Elizabeth's heart was thumping so wildly she could barely draw breath. Was she about to have a heart attack?

‘Move along, please.'

‘I'll be talking to Francis Rossi about this!' Though what a waste of time that would be. Any debt he'd once owed her had well and truly been paid off.

‘Up to you,' Gould said impassively as he firmly manoeuvred her along the path. Other people in the cemetery were beginning to stare now.

‘Wait! My reticule!'

Constable Morley fetched it for her. At the lychgate she spotted Jack tearing across the street.

‘What the hell's going on?' he shouted. ‘Get your dirty hands off her!'

‘Stay where you are,' Gould ordered. ‘She's under arrest.'

‘What the fuck for?'

‘The murder of her husband.'

Jack opened his mouth, then shut it again.

‘It's all right, Jack,' Elizabeth said, ‘I'll sort it out. Go home, but try not to upset Friday. I don't want her getting on the gin.'

‘Where are you taking her?' Jack demanded.

‘To the police court,' Gould said. ‘To the cells.'

‘For God's sake, she's an old lady!'

Gould hesitated, then said, ‘Can't be helped. She's under arrest,' as he and Morley led Elizabeth towards a plain black four-seater phaeton parked near the cemetery boundary.

‘We'll get a solicitor,' Jack said, darting alongside. ‘No, we'll get a barrister. We'll get two.'

‘Just go, Jack,' Elizabeth said. ‘It'll be all right.'

But it wouldn't, and she knew it. Morley helped her up into the carriage — hauled her, really: he was much rougher than the other cove — and she gazed out over the burial ground while Gould sat beside her and Morley climbed into the driver's seat. She couldn't quite see Gil's grave, but she could feel him and his presence was an enormous comfort.

‘We'll dig it up, you know, that tomb,' Morley said over his shoulder.

Elizabeth didn't respond.

Morley went on. ‘He's in there, your old man, isn't he?' he said as he flicked the reins and the horses moved off.

‘Shut up,' Gould said.

‘Well, she pretty well admitted it.' Morley's voice was filled with glee.
‘And
that she blew his brains out!'

Gould kicked the bottom of Morley's seat. ‘I said shut up!'

‘How long have you been spying on me?' Elizabeth asked.

‘Not spying,' Gould said. ‘Surveillance. A couple of months.'

That made sense. It had been two months since the police had been to the Siren's Arms and searched the cellar.

‘What will happen now?'

Gould answered without looking at her. ‘The grave will be exhumed, and if there are two sets of remains, there'll be a trial. We'll be required to testify regarding what we heard you say.'

‘How long would I have to wait for the trial?'

‘It could take at least a year, possibly longer.'

She'd known that before she'd even asked. ‘And I'd be kept in gaol the whole time?'

‘Yes.'

‘But I'd never survive. I'm an old woman.'

Gould looked both guilty and regretful. ‘I know. I'm sorry. You could maybe use any money you've got to make your time there more tolerable.'

Elizabeth stared at him.

He finally glanced at her. ‘Do you own that hotel? You could sell that and use the proceeds. I believe that's what other wealthy folk do. It usually beggars them, but at least they don't have to eat maggoty gruel and share a barracks with a hundred lice-ridden wretches. You could afford your own cell.'

Sell the Siren's Arms? ‘And the trial? What's likely to happen then?'

Gould gave the only answer that, in her situation, was conceivable, and they both knew it. ‘Well, if you're found guilty, you'll go to the gallows.'

‘Straight away?'

‘Depends on the magistrate.'

Elizabeth comprehended very well that she couldn't tolerate waiting around to hang without knowing when. And she also knew she couldn't bear to see all her hard-earnt money frittered — and there was a
lot
of it — and the Siren sold just so she could pay hugely over the odds for food, a mattress and a single cell in George Street gaol.

Morley drove over a pothole, rattling the crap out of the carriage, and she took the opportunity to lean in to Constable
Gould and settle a hand on his arm. ‘Will you do something for an old lady?'

He eyed her warily.

‘Before we go to the police court, will you please take me home so I can collect a few things to make my stay in the cells a little more pleasant?'

‘I don't know about that,' he said, alarmed.

‘I do wish you would. As an older woman, I have certain needs and medical requirements, and I promise it'll only take a few minutes. You can come in with me if you like.'

‘What sort of things do you need?'

‘Laudanum and other medicines for a certain women's affliction, and spare underthings. I'm a little unreliable when it comes to my waterworks.'

Constable Gould's face went the colour of a beetroot. He grimaced, rubbed the back of his neck then leant forwards and poked Morley in the back.

‘What?'

‘Go down to Harrington Street before we go back to the police court.'

‘What for?'

‘Just do it, will you! Who's the senior officer here? Not you.'

Elizabeth sat back, her earlier dread and panic replaced now by an odd sense of certainty and an almost beatific serenity. Everything
would
be all right.

‘Fuck, fuck,
fuck!
What are we going to do?' Friday sat in the office with her hands on her head, gripping great fistfuls of her hair, wide-eyed with distress and not sure whether to smash something or burst into tears.

Jack had arrived home fifteen minutes earlier, having raced all the way from Devonshire Street: Jimmy had just unharnessed the poor horse, its eyes rolling and nostrils flaring, sweat lathered
along its body. Aria had interrupted Friday mid-session, and she'd bundled her customer off with the hurried promise of a free two-hour appointment at a later date.

‘We've got to get her a barrister,' Jack said, his face pale and his hair sticking up. ‘I don't know any, do you?'

‘No, but I think Sarah does,' Friday replied.

Jack asked, ‘Er, she did kill him, didn't she? It
is
him in that grave?'

‘Yeah, but it was ages ago.'

Aria said, ‘I know Mrs Hislop's solicitor. Perhaps he can recommend a barrister.'

Friday frowned. ‘How do you know her solicitor?'

‘Never mind that now. Get out of those silly clothes. We have to get to the police court.'

‘Oh!' Friday had just had a brilliant idea. ‘Lucian will know someone. He knows everyone.'

‘I'll get Jimmy to get another horse ready,' Jack said.

Friday grabbed his arm. ‘Hang on, the police don't know about the brothel, do they?'

‘Dunno. Didn't sound like it. They just said she was under arrest for the murder of her husband.'

That didn't mean they weren't aware, Friday thought. She'd have to try and have a private word with Mrs H, to find out what they knew. Oh God, what a bloody disastrous thing to happen. Who the
hell
had tipped them off about the grave? The same two-faced piece of shite who'd told them about the cellar?

She changed in the dressing room, then said, ‘I'm going over to our room to get a pile of money. It's probably too late to try a bribe but you never know.'

Aria said, ‘What should we tell the girls?'

‘Nothing yet.'

Friday put Connie in charge, telling her they'd be back in a couple of hours. She and Aria hurried across to the hotel and were
just about to go upstairs when, to their amazement, Mrs H herself appeared in the foyer. But Friday's knee-buckling relief, and rather unrealistic hope that the whole thing had been some sort of bizarre misunderstanding, were immediately shattered when right behind her loomed two grim-faced men, scruffily dressed but presumably the policemen Jack had described.

‘Friday, my dear,' Elizabeth said cheerily. ‘And Aria! Employees and, of course, friends,' she explained to the men.

‘Oh Christ, it's true?' Friday asked.

‘Well, that depends on what “it” is, doesn't it?'

‘Jack said you've been arrested.'

Elizabeth's eyes twinkled. ‘Apparently so. For the murder of my husband, no less.'

‘God
, Mrs H!'

‘Oh, don't worry, love. Constable Gould here's looking after me. I'm here to pick up a few things to make my stay in the cells more comfortable, a privilege he's very kindly granted me.
And
he's removed my manacles. Such a nuisance and so heavy!'

Friday glanced again at the two men, and decided the embarrassed-looking one must be Gould.

‘He tells me that gaol can be a very unpleasant place and suggested I use my savings and sell any businesses I own to improve my lot there. Well, as you know, the only business I have is the Siren's Arms, but the money from that should go quite a long way.' Elizabeth gave Gould a radiant smile.

Friday breathed a tiny sigh of relief. Clearly the matter of the brothel hadn't been raised.

‘Get a move on,' the other constable said. ‘This isn't a social visit.'

Jack appeared, looking bewildered. ‘What's going on?' he whispered to Friday. ‘Why's she not at the police court?'

‘He's letting her pick up some things.' Friday indicated Gould.

‘May I say goodbye?' Elizabeth asked.

Morley warned, ‘No passing messages.'

Elizabeth embraced Aria. ‘Goodbye, my dear. Take care of Friday, won't you? She needs you.'

Aria nodded. ‘We will see you soon, Mrs Hislop, and we will get you a very good barrister. Do not worry.'

‘I won't.' Elizabeth turned to Jack. ‘I'm glad you're here. You're the best fixer I've ever had, Jack. Never ever less than loyal. Thank you.' She gave him a quick but heartfelt hug.

Then it was Friday's turn. ‘You've always reminded me so much of my daughter. You know that, don't you?'