Antidote To Murder (19 page)

She turned her hand in his and squeezed back. “And I you. I’m sorry I didn’t reply to your calls. Stubborn pride. Stupid of me.”

“It is I who was stupid.” He rose from his seat and gently wrapped his arms around her.

During the nightmare of the last week, she had refused to admit her need for him, even to herself. Now she wondered how she could have been so stubborn, so certain she was right.

“Are we friends again?” he asked as he pressed his cheek against hers.

They had never been in one another’s arms quite like this before. She breathed in his clean, comforting scent. He felt so right; he smelled so right. Lord, the feelings he stirred when he was close to her—if this was how it felt to be supported and cherished, she did not want to let him go.

“We could be more than friends—if you wish it, that is.”

The words slipped from her mouth without thought. Good God, what must he think of such forwardness? Even her freethinking mother would not have condoned such a brazen invitation. She was wondering how she might take the words back, when he tightened his embrace and murmured into her ear, “Of course I wish it.”

He was moving his lips towards hers when a scream reached them from the street. Pike knocked her to the ground and threw himself on top of her just as the front window shattered, spraying their backs with shards of glass. “Stay down,” he said, covering her head. Dody smelled petroleum fumes, heard the crackling of fire, felt the press of Pike’s body on hers.

There was a sudden
whoosh
and he jumped to his feet.

The door flew open and Florence rushed into the room, crying, “The curtains are on fire!” Pike pushed her to the floor next to Dody, ripped off his frock coat, and started beating the flames with it. “Stay down, both of you!”

Neither sister obeyed. Florence tore flowers from a crystal vase and successfully doused one of the curtains. “I’ll run downstairs and get more water,” she said as she rushed off.

“There’s someone hurt in the street. I’m going to help,” Dody called as she picked up her bag and ran from the room.

“No, Dody, no!” Pike cried.

“The fire’s under control; there’s no need to stop me.”

Pike threw his hands into the air. “But the mob isn’t—stay here!”

Dody dashed into the hall and flung open the leadlight door. She flew down the steps, across the short path, through the gate, and into the street.

A straggle of troublemakers took off at her approach, bolting across the road and disappearing into the cool shadows of Cartwright Gardens. She found the man alone, huddled in the foetal position on the footpath outside the front of her house. Several vehicles pulled over to the side of the road to observe the goings-on. Passengers and drivers gawped from motorcars and carriages.

The man on the ground moaned, “I’m burnin’ up, I’m burnin’ up.”

“It’s all right. I can help you. I’m a doctor.”

“It hurts, miss—”

“That’s the risk you take when you throw firebombs through windows.”

Dody looked up from her crouched position to see Pike looming above her, blocking the murky sky with his back.

“Likely he dripped fuel onto himself when he was making the bomb, and when he lit the petroleum-soaked rag, he flared up, too.”

Pike’s theory seemed to explain the man’s injuries, the charred shirtfront, the weeping flesh that oozed beneath one of his ragged sleeves.

“Help me bring him inside,” Dody said.

Pike remained where he was. “He could have killed you.”

Dody repeated her command and rolled the man onto his back. She drew a sharp breath as she stared down at the familiar, concave face. “I’ve seen this man before,” she said, “once hanging around the mortuary and again today in the East End. I need to talk to him.”

Pike bent to examine his face. The man clamped his eyes shut. “I’ve seen him before, too, during my Scotland Yard days. In fact, we’re well acquainted, aren’t we, Mr. Dunn? Dr. McCleland, meet Daniel Dunn, known troublemaker and thief.”

“Whoever he is, he needs medical attention,” Dody said.

Dunn’s eyes popped open.

“Wait just a minute, Dody,” Pike said, his gaze not wavering from the man. “Why were you here causing a disturbance and firebombing Dr. McCleland’s house? Who put you up to it?”

Dunn screamed and tossed his head from side to side. “I dunno, I dunno!”

He brought his uninjured hand to his chest. Bony fingers twitched at the fabric of his shirt. And then, before they knew it, he’d jumped to his feet, a steel blade flashing in his hand.

Pike pressed Dody to take a step back. “Don’t be a fool. Drop it,” he said, his eyes fixed on the trembling knife.

“Your burns need seeing to, Mr. Dunn. You need to be taken to the hospital,” Dody said. It was worth a try, despite her feelings that the man’s strange, electric charge seemed to have eclipsed all sense of reason. “Left untreated, you might die.”

She tried to take a step towards him. Pike gripped her arm and held her back.

“I’ll die if I do and I’ll die if I don’t—what difference does it make?” Dunn shrieked.

Pike called to one of the gawping motorists, “Fetch the police,” and took a step closer to the injured man. The motorist, Dody noticed, made no attempt to move. This was probably more entertaining than anything on offer at the Variety.

“Pike, be careful,” Dody cried.

And then a zippy little black Crossley pulled up, honking its horn. The driver, wearing cap, goggles, and scarf, flung the front passenger door open and yelled, “Get in!” to Dunn.

Dunn took advantage of Pike’s distraction and let loose a kick to his bad knee. Pike hit the footpath with a curse. Dunn threw himself into the black motorcar, which then chugged at speed towards the main thoroughfare, Euston Road.

Pike was on his feet in no time, commandeering one of the other idling vehicles, a baker’s van, and its driver. Before Dody knew it, she was left alone on the footpath, her eyes straining as she followed the van disappearing into the bustle of the street.

Chapter Twenty-Two

P
ike focused on the car they were chasing until his eyes hurt. The road was jammed with almost identical black motorcars, hansoms, and taxis, and they lost sight of the Crossley on several occasions.

“Oi, Chief Inspector, looks like he’s heading east to Pentonville Road. Should ’ave known him for an East-Ender, sewer rats, the lot of ’em,” the driver, Cuthbert, said.

But just as they passed the twin arches of Kings Cross Station, Dunn’s car took a sharp right, changing south down Grays Inn Road, parallel to where the chase had originated. And then they turned right into Guildford Street. Pike understood the Crossley driver’s intentions as soon as he turned left at the Foundling Hospital. Here the road was much narrower with smaller streets wavering from it like wispy roots. The baker’s van would have difficulty getting through if they became any smaller.

They came upon a delivery cart piled with empty barrels at a standstill halfway through the brewery gates. The cart was overloaded, too high to pass under the hanging sign, and several barrels had crashed to the road and split. Even if the road were wider, Pike thought with exasperation, they would never have got past this crowd. Workmen yelled as passersby stopped to scoop up the frothing liquid, carrying it away in shoes, hats, and anything else that came to hand.

Pike ignored the throbbing of his knee and jumped from the van, cursing as he landed in a river of beer. He handed the driver sixpence, telling Cuthbert there would be more where that came from if he would wait.

Then, on the other side of the cart, Pike saw something that made him smile. Luck at last! Under his gaze and as if to his will, the Crossley backfired, began to slow, and then puttered to a halt at the top of the cobbled lane, its engine flooded with beer, Pike supposed. He silently cheered. Give him a bicycle or a horse over a motorcar any day.

The driver leaped from his stricken vehicle and, with the tails of his white coat flapping, attempted to crank-start the car. Dunn remained in the vehicle until he saw Pike hurrying towards him. He shouted a warning to the driver then lurched from the passenger door. The driver turned quickly. He was of about average height, Pike noted, with no distinguishing features visible on account of the motoring outfit.

The flying crank missed Pike’s head by a whisker. He changed direction, deciding to aim for the target of least resistance. Daniel Dunn stumbled towards an alley. Pike closed the distance in no time and tackled him to the ground.

Dunn did not require much restraining; a hand on his collar was the only force required to navigate him to the van. Pike shoved him in next to Cuthbert and then hopped onto the running board, using the higher vantage point to scan his surroundings. He saw no sign of the goggled motorist with the flapping white cotton coat.

* * *

P
ike dismissed Cuthbert outside Dody’s house with another sixpence and his heartfelt thanks. With Dunn’s good arm draped around his shoulder, Pike commenced to haul him up the steps.

“I want the doctor to have a look at you here before the police take you to hospital,” Pike said in a low, steady voice. The sooner they could get some information from him, the better.

“I don’t wanna go to no hospital,” the man whined.

“You might die if you don’t.” Pike paused for a breath; this was hard work. “Then again, you might also die if you fail to answer my questions.”

Pike abhorred the bullyboy policemen he came across so often, and rarely put the boot in himself, but there were occasions when even he believed the end justified the means. This man could have killed Dody and there was still someone out there who might yet succeed. He needed a name.

“What questions?” Dunn asked.

“Who paid you to firebomb the doctor’s house?”

“Dunno.”

“Was it the same man who picked you up here in the motorcar?”

Dunn paused. “Maybe.”

Pike gripped the man’s burned arm until he screamed. “I dunno, I dunno!”

Pike hissed him silent as the front door opened and Dody appeared on the porch. “Of course you know—you might be an idiot, but you have to know something about the man who employed you.” Again Pike moved his hand. The man released a bloodcurdling scream before he had even touched it.

“No, Pike!” Dody said with a raised hand and a fierce look. “I know we need answers, but that’s not the way—let’s get him into the house first.”

Pike turned his eyes skywards. He’d lost his chance now, damn it.

Between the two of them they lifted Dunn up the front steps into the house and lowered him onto the chaise in the morning room. The room smelled of burned fabric. The parquetry floor was puddled with water and the oriental rug was sodden underfoot. Annie was attempting to mop up and grumbling to everyone who got in her way. She gave the man on the chaise a sharp look and wrung the mop in the bucket as if she wished it were his neck.

Pike felt the same way.

Florence looked first at Dunn and then at Pike. “Well done, Pike,” she said, then turned her attention to Fletcher, who was busy hammering boards across the jagged windowpane. “And after you’ve done that, Fletcher, you can fetch the glaziers.”

“Everyone, please clear the room. I need space,” Dody ordered. “Annie, the floor can wait. Get me a large bowl of water, bicarbonate of soda, and some soft, clean rags; Florence, telephone for the police.”
She would have made an excellent army officer,
Pike decided.

Soon, Dody and Pike were alone in the room with Daniel Dunn. Dody gave him some laudanum from a sherry glass and waited for the drug to take effect.

Pike took out his handkerchief and wiped his face clean of sweat and soot, flicking the tablets from the admiral’s murder scene to the floor. Dody picked them up and examined them.

“Those are the tablets I was telling you about, identified on the spot by the police surgeon as strychnine,” Pike said.

“He managed to do that very quickly, I must say. I would have ordered a laboratory test.”

“The police surgeon is old-school, like so many of my colleagues. He tasted them.”

“How dangerous.” She turned the tablets over. “Ah. I should be surprised, but somehow I am not.” She pointed out some strange indentations on the tablets’ surface. “I’ve seen these markings on tablets before—lead tablets distributed from pubs in the East End for abortion and infanticide. These marks are also identical to those on the lead tablets that Esther Craddock was taking.”

“They are from the same supplier?” Pike asked.

“I think so; at least they were produced by the same press.”

Pike smiled. “Now that is the kind of proof I’m looking for—for both of our cases. But I suppose it now means we will have to inspect the presses of every dispensing chemist in the area.”

“It’s not that simple. Some doctors still make their own tablets and apothecaries do, too.” A moan from her patient caught her attention. “But let’s forget about that for a moment. The laudanum should have taken effect by now and it’s time I got to work.”

Pike shook his head at her ability to block out her own problems to tend to the needs of another.

She cut the sleeves from Dunn’s arms and exposed patches of angry, weeping flesh. “My house is cleaner than a hospital. Tended here first, we will reduce the chance of infection,” she said as she worked.

The man responsible for employing Dunn must have something to do with Dody’s accusation,
Pike thought as he watched her deft fingers,
might even be the abortionist himself
. Getting the truth from the injured man would be a much simpler solution than testing every pill press in the East End. And yet there was something niggling his mind, gnawing away at it—something that he had not yet had the chance to discuss with Dody.

Somehow, everything seemed too simple. Why should someone go to all this trouble to frame Dody, kill her even, to stop her from getting to the source of some illegally produced lead tablets? There was no doubt about it, abortion and abortifacients were handy earners—he’d dealt with enough cases during his time at the Yard to learn that—but compared to other moneymaking rackets, the proceeds of such sales would surely be small fry.

His instincts told him they were up against something more powerful and more fearsome than Dody had imagined. Pills like those found in the admiral’s possession showed that the supplier covered a broad spectrum of problems and that he did not limit himself to the needs of the working classes. It was imperative to get some answers from Dunn.

Florence and Annie returned to the room with the items Dody had requested. Dody dismissed them both, telling Pike when they’d left that neither girl had the stomach for medical emergencies.

Pike watched, awed by her professional calm and wincing as, with steady hands, she used forceps to pull threads of burned fabric from the oozing wounds. She added several teaspoons of the bicarbonate to the water, swirled it around, and soaked as many rags as would fit in the bowl before applying them to the burned areas of Dunn’s arms and chest. Chalky water dripped all over the chaise.

“Annie will be furious; she is constantly cleaning this chaise.” Her lips rose into a delightful smile. Despite his frustration, Pike could not help responding with a smile of his own. Before he had got to know them, he remembered what a colleague had said about the McCleland sisters, how he considered the younger to be the more attractive of the two. That was true to a degree; Florence was stunning and turned heads wherever she went, her allure only increased by her obvious lack of interest in men. But Dody was different again; hers was a quiet, thoughtful beauty, a natural beauty, and her indifference to it made it all the more radiant.

He tore his eyes away from Dody’s face. Dunn seemed calmer now, more relaxed.

“Feeling better?” Dody asked.

Dunn nodded. “A bit. But I’ll ’ave more of that stuff now, if you please, Doc.”

Dody hesitated, then glanced at Pike. He got the message and drew back. He’d failed to get the truth from Dunn his way—perhaps a softer method of interrogation was called for.

“Mr. Dunn,” Dody said, “I’ll give you some more laudanum if you tell me who paid you to bomb my house.”

“Gimme the stuff first.”

“After you’ve told us who you are working for.”

Dunn clamped his jaw and shook his head.

“Things will be a lot easier for you if you cooperate,” Pike said.

Dody picked up the laudanum bottle and poured a measure into the sherry glass. “Tell us first,” she said, holding the glass just out of Dunn’s reach. Caught by the light, the liquid in the glass released an inviting, reddish-brown glow.

“I can’t, ’e’ll kill me!” With a cry of desperation, Dunn lunged for the glass and would have fallen from the chaise if Pike had not caught him.

Dody slowly poured the powerful painkiller back into the bottle and pressed down the cork.

The injured man closed his eyes and began to moan.

Florence put her head around the door. The police were waiting to see them in the hall.

* * *

A
sense of duty forced Pike to decline the invitation to dine with the McCleland sisters. His day was not over yet, and his conscience would not allow him to enjoy the evening with the death of the admiral weighing on his mind, not to mention the possibly wrongful incarceration of Margaretha. After Dody’s revelations about the strychnine tablets, he was beginning to believe the dancer might have been telling him the truth. Had the admiral’s death been caused by misadventure, and not murder at all? There was a certain cold comfort to that notion, even though it did not solve the mystery of the missing papers. There was still a spy in the midst of Margaretha’s dancing troop; of that he had no doubt.

He yawned. It had been a long day. Had the admiral only died that morning? It seemed like a lifetime ago.

The hansom swayed. Pike put his work-related problems aside and relived the memory of that brief moment alone with Dody before the explosion. She had told him she would like to be more than friends. Or had she? The bomb came so soon after she had uttered the words that he might have misheard or even imagined them.

The cool of the cells and the sight of a miserable Margaretha through the door’s grille drove thoughts of romance from his mind. She was still half-dressed as he had left her that morning and huddled beneath a ratty blanket on the plank bed. Dried tears had carved runnels through her face paint, and the skin beneath her eyes was stained as black as a panda bear’s. The sight triggered an idea; it was a wild one, but worth a try.

He wrote down Gabriel Klassen’s name and the address of his hotel for the constable. “Get someone to contact this man and tell him to bring her in some clothes.” The constable said he would and ushered Pike into the cell.

Margaretha sat bolt upright on the bed.

“Leave the door unlocked and send some coffee in, too, please, Constable,” Pike said.

“Are you sure, sir? She’s a wild one.”

“I think she might want to listen to what I have to say.” He spoke to the constable, but looked at Margaretha. “She might be out of here by morning if she cooperates.”

Margaretha pushed a clump of hair from her face and regarded him suspiciously.

He pulled a chair out from the rough table and invited her to sit. She held the blanket tight around her chest. She had a look about her that Pike had seen more often than he cared to remember: the look of a woman who had been abused, intimidated, and exploited by men for most of her life.

“We need to talk more about those tablets the admiral took,” he said.

“I know nothing about those bloody tablets. I told you that.”

“I have to find out where the admiral got them from.”

“
Achnier
. How am I supposed to know?”

“Do you realise just how close to a prison sentence you are? Tell me, Margaretha, tell me, please—where did he get those tablets from?”

Her arms flailed. Desperately she looked around the cell as if the answers could be found inscribed on its dank grey walls. “He mentioned something about the East End. He said you could find anything in the East End if you were prepared to pay for it. I know he used to visit the area sometimes—he brought the smell back with him on his clothes.”