Horatio Lyle (10 page)

‘What do you mean,
ask
people?’ sighed Tess.

‘As in knock on their doors and be pushy.’

‘Must we?’

‘Yes.’

‘They’ll laugh at me.’

‘They might laugh at
you
,’ said Lyle sagely, ‘but I’m sure they won’t laugh at Thomas.’

Thomas realized they were staring at him. And they were grinning.

 

Left with Tess in the gloomy street that stank of mouldering laundry, stale water and tar, Lyle stared at the dark brown stain on the ground that indicated Carwell’s last living point in space and time, and felt something rise up in him bordering on anger. He was surprised at himself - usually these things were just scientific anomalies to be studied, and others could be angry. But as people jostled past him, some even walking on the bloodstain darkening the pavement without realizing what they did, he felt a certain anger at the world, not just at the murderer. He wanted to stand up and say, ‘Don’t you realize a man has slit another man’s throat in cold blood? Don’t you realize what this says about people in general?’ He didn’t. He stared at the ground and thought furiously.

‘What you thinkin’, Mister Lyle?’

He didn’t answer. He thought,
Carwell and Bray. Bray and Carwell. And Jack Carwell too, the younger brother who always followed Gordon Carwell into whatever venture, whatever peril. Was he a part of it too? The bloodstain by the Bank was large, the direction of the blood not quite right for a disabling wound, something like that would kill instantly, but Carwell ran . . . where Gordon Carwell goes, Jack always follows . . .

‘Mister Lyle?’

‘Yes, Teresa?’

‘What you thinkin’?’

‘I’m thinking
. . .
’
How did he manage to get the letter of approval from the Elwick house? The right seal, the right stamp?
‘A letter from the Elwick family would be hard to forge. You’d have to have an original to work from, the right paper, the right seal, the right signature.’

‘You think the bigwig knows?’

‘The bigwig?’

‘Thomas,’ she said with a shrug. ‘The bigwig.’

He frowned, and shrugged half-heartedly. Something was itching at the back of his neck, something stirring deep inside that made him want to find a dark doorway to hide in. He scanned the street distractedly, and thought,
Carwell must have been acting on orders.

‘Mister Lyle?’

‘Would you break into the Bank of England without a specific target?’

‘Not bl
. . .
not likely, Mister Lyle.’

‘And inside you wouldn’t steal a stone plate?’

‘Hell
. . .
uh
. . .
no. Not if someone weren’t payin’ me.’

‘That ’s
it
. Carwell had to be paid, someone had to
pay
him to steal the plate, otherwise why would he do it? Someone had to be out there to take the plate, someone who can pay a lot, risk a lot for a plate.’

‘Like Lord Lincoln?’

‘Like Lo
. . .
Teresa, that is not a helpful comment.’

‘Sorry, Mister Lyle. But
. . .
if Mister Lincoln wants it, then you said it’s gonna be important, ain’t it?’

‘If they want the Plate badly enough to break into the Bank,’ murmured Lyle distractedly, ‘perhaps they wait outside?’

She shrugged.

‘Besides, no one eats exotic fruit in this part of town - few people eat it at all. Luxury, decadence, money, eating while you wait for Carwell to come out with the Plate, at night when no one else is watching.’

‘Coo-ee, Mister Lyle?’

‘Teresa?’

‘Yes, Mister Lyle?’

‘If someone paid you a sovereign to steal something, and asked you to hand it straight over, would you?’

‘Depends how big that person’s knife were, Mister Lyle.’

‘If you thought you could get two sovereigns instead of one, would you go to the drop-off with the item?’

She thought about it. Finally she said, ‘I might’ve given it to someone. To hide, an’ all. So that they couldn’t hurt me. ’Cos I wouldn’t have it.’

The silence dragged.

‘They killed Carwell. But Carwell might not have been carrying the Plate.’

‘Maybe not.’

‘They let him run after they’d stabbed him and then they
killed
him, like
. . .
’

‘Mister Lyle?’

‘Something must have gone wrong, that’s the only reason Bray would have gone so quickly underground. Carwell was clever, he knew that Bray going under would have drawn unnecessary suspicion to him, so something must have gone wrong. Carwell got stabbed by the people who paid him to steal the Plate and Bray’s probably still got the Plate and
. . .
’

‘Mister Lyle!’

He jumped, looked round and realized people were watching him. He coughed uncomfortably, and turned away to study the nearest wall, trying not to whistle nonchalantly. There was no proof, he knew that. There was instinct, and it was
right
.

And just behind that instinct, he had another, more uncomfortable feeling: of being watched. He turned and scanned the street, but those who had stared at first were now drifting by again, uninterested in anything except their daily lives. Still the itchy feeling persisted, like something he couldn’t scratch at the back of his neck. He looked down at the pavement and saw, in the gutter, a small flash of orange. He hesitated, then slowly squatted and picked it up carefully by the corner. It was orange peel, dirty and hard. It lay a few feet away from the pool of blood, and was discoloured by something more than just natural processes. He put it carefully into the paper bag, next to the fruit stone.

Someone, he decided, had a taste for fruit.

‘Mister Lyle?’

‘Teresa.’

‘You seen him yet?’

‘The man in the crooked top hat hiding in the doorway?’

‘Oh. You seen him.’

‘Teresa, I have a little job for you.’

 

Thomas was elated, for a number of reasons. Firstly, because the second he’d walked into the bakery and said, ‘Excuse me, ma’am?’ the lady behind the counter had assumed he was the Heir Apparent, and started gushing over him in a cockney dialect so unintelligible it had been all he could do to keep nodding and smiling. This nodding and smiling had so delighted the employees of the bakery that they had begun clapping and rejoicing, saying that at last fortune had come to them with an aristocratic jacket and an aristocratic accent, and so buoyant had they been at receiving, for the very first time, a ‘client of breeding in our ’umble store’ they had insisted on showing him their full selection.

And he had bought a hot cross bun.

A
hot cross bun
. Never in his whole life had he been allowed to buy such a treat, never had he
bought
something with his own hands, and now it was between his fingers and he could just eat it, in the street, taking large, undignified mouthfuls and
Father would never know
! This triumph had swelled him with confidence and, as a result, he had knocked on a whole five doors with half the bun still in his hand and demanded in a voice booming with authority, ‘Ma’am, I am here to enquire about a murder.’ ‘
Enquire
about a murder
.’ It was a phrase he’d never thought he could say. The words felt mature and weighty, big fat words that you could toss on to a barge and watch chug upstream with stately grandeur. It was the ‘enquire ’ and it was the ‘about’ and it was the ‘murder’. In fact, it was probably the ‘a’ too. He had been so full of satisfaction at the sudden rush of responsibility that when he got to the sixth door and the woman who answered it said, ‘Really? Was that what the carriage was about?’ he hardly noticed.

This led to the second cause of his elation. He scampered back to where Lyle was leaning against a wall, staring up at the thin elusive break of sky in the dark street with a thoughtful expression, and immediately began his report in as adult a voice as he could. His chest heaved, his shoulders bulged, his voice resounded with authority as he barked, ‘Sir, I have information, sir.’

Lyle looked at him out of the corner of his eye. ‘Good,’ he said in a tone that, even to Thomas’s ears, sounded slightly too bright to be true. ‘What is it?’

He recited it carefully. ‘Mrs Farse, who lives by the butcher’s, said she heard the sound of a carriage late last night. She could-n’t sleep because of a toothache and claims she roused herself to find a drink. Well, sir, she says she remembers the carriage, sir, because it was so late, and because you rarely get many objects that sound like that down here, at least, she thinks you don’t, and she remembered hearing the horses, sir, and running feet. Personally I think that if she really did have a toothache then
. . .
’

‘Did she look out?’

‘Yes, sir, but it was very dark.’

‘Well, what did she see?’

‘She saw a carriage, sir.’

‘Really.’ Lyle ’s face was unreadable.

‘Yes, sir!’ Thomas blurted, aware that he was starting to lose some of his authority. ‘She saw a four-seater, sir, with two horses, standing there, but the driver wasn’t sitting on it and the horses weren’t moving.’

‘What colour was it?’

‘It all looked black to her.’

‘Including the horses?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Did she see any people?’

‘No, sir, but she says the window was down on one side of the carriage and there must have been someone inside because there was a white-gloved hand resting on the window!’

‘It might have been someone ’s disembodied hand,’ suggested Lyle mildly. He saw Thomas’s hurt expression and added, ‘This is very useful. Do carry on.’

‘Well, after a minute she saw the driver return, dressed up formally, sir, in livery.’

‘Black?’ suggested Lyle.

‘Yes, sir. And he was carrying a bag. She said she saw the driver look through it, then whoever was in the carriage also looked through it. And she says she saw
gold
, sir.’

Lyle brightened. ‘Just gold?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘No stone bowls radiating cultural significance, by any chance?’

‘No, sir. She was very specific. Just gold, through and through. The man inside the carriage seemed to get angry. She thought she heard shouting.’

Lyle was by this point grinning ear to ear. He slapped Thomas on the shoulder. ‘Excellent!’

‘Then the carriage drove off, sir.’ It seemed, to Thomas, like a bit of an anti-climax.

Lyle, however, looked ecstatic. ‘This is excellent news, lad! Well done.’

‘Thank you, sir.’

‘You ever think of being a detective?’

And Thomas thought of another world, foggy and vague round the edges, that he knew existed, but had never seen; and after all those hunts and all those dances and all those evenings sipping tea to the gentle patter of rain and polite conversation, he remembered sitting up in bed when everything else was asleep, and swearing that
he
would make a difference. ‘All the time, sir,’ he whispered.

Lyle wasn’t listening. He detached himself from the wall, smiling broadly, wrapped a fatherly arm round Thomas’s shoulder and said, ‘Come on. Let’s go and find ourselves a carriage.’

‘Shouldn’t we wait for Miss Teresa, sir?’

Lyle’s smile turned slightly evil. ‘Miss Teresa is doing a very special job at the moment.’

 

Tess was bored. She had been looking forward to traipsing round with Thomas, in order to ridicule him a little when he couldn’t understand what the locals were saying, and possibly to pick his pocket while he wasn’t looking. The boy, she was convinced, would be a mark for any decent thief, despite his burgeoning height and strength. However, as she had moved to follow Thomas, Lyle had put a restraining hand on her shoulder. Her talents, she knew, lay in different areas.

And now she was lurking in a doorway, watching everyone, and feeling bored. She had done this since she was old enough to tell the difference between bulging pockets and sagging pockets, and the pockets in this place were, generally speaking, bulging. And she wasn’t allowed to touch them. So she had watched Lyle. For a while he ’d just stood there, staring at the blood. Then he ’d leant against a wall and stared at the sky, not moving, Tate lying dutifully across his feet, where he seemed to be most comfortable, also not moving. Then Thomas had come back, and by both his and Lyle’s expressions, the news had been good from the people around the bridge. Then the two of them had started walking.

Tess had moved out of the shadows when they were thirty yards ahead of her and, keeping a shoulder to the wall, drifted along behind them, now very much alert. She had followed them up towards Cheapside with its bustling shops and shouting hawkers, joining the flow of people, ducking top hats and walking canes and leather boots and tweed elbows, keeping in sight as a guide Lyle’s sandy-red hair, brighter than the black top hats that moved through the streets, and when not searching for that, watching the people. Sailors, smelling of salt and tar and fish and sweat and grease, businessmen with white silk handkerchiefs and ivory-capped canes that they swung with a deadly ease, women with trays slung from their shoulders bearing steaming packets of nuts or fruit or vegetables or biscuits or tins of mushy peas or soup or flowers, or girls selling handfuls of ribbon, or burly men setting up their coffee cauldrons under the nearest bedraggled and blackened tree, or the priest scurrying to the service at St Paul’s or at the Guild Church with the gold dragon sitting on top of it, facing perpetually north despite the wind, or the man with the music box and the money, or the Dutch singers, or the bobbies in their blue top hats and capes, who she strained to avoid out of habit, or
. . .