Kitty Peck and the Music Hall Murders (21 page)

Now the old bugger was about to grease his own nephew as a trap to catch me. I wondered just how long I would have lasted as James Verdin’s private fancy before another accident happened to me. It was all fitting into place now. I had something ‘more’ to take to Lady Ginger at last.

A couple of legals stepped out of a side passage and into the alleyway. Their black gowns swirled into the mist around their ankles as they walked ahead of me. I’d like to see Sir Richard Verdin in the dock, I thought. What would his fine friends think of him if they knew?

But what exactly
did
I know? As I walked my mind was flicking through faces, voices, words and pictures like it was the pages of Sam Collins’s notebook.

The legals stopped at a tall narrow building. One of them rapped on the door and they turned to watch me pass by while they waited for someone to open it.

The alley was deserted now, the air ahead so thick with fog that I could just make out the sickly halo of light around a lamp up ahead. I misjudged my footing and slipped on some uneven cobbles, ripping my stocking on the jagged stones. I cursed, and rubbed at the torn cotton. Another shilling gone west, I thought.

I straightened up and pushed my hands under the folds of my shawl to keep them warm. I wondered what time it was. No later than six, I thought, but already dark. I needed to shift to get back to The Gaudy. I took another step forward and stopped again, dead still. The hairs on the back of my neck bristled.

Now I heard it properly – the sound of footsteps behind me. Footsteps that stopped and started up again just at the same moment I did.

‘Philomel.’

The name slithered off the walls around me. I turned, but there was no one there, no one I could see.

The fog was moving, forming itself into shapes and shadows as it drifted over the cobbles. One moment it was almost transparent and I could see through it to the glistening stones, next thing it rolled itself into a mass that seemed to block off the end of the alley like a dirty grey wall.

‘Who’s there?’ My own voice echoed off the stones. It sounded thin and small.

No one answered. The fog billowed and faded around the gas lamp. Now I could see the sharp black outlines of the buildings marking the far end of the alley. Just there I knew it broadened out into a road that led down into Fleet Street. There were bound to be people about, it wasn’t late.

I balled my fists and started to walk, straining to hear footsteps behind.

Nothing.

I quickened my step and then I broke into a run, my boots drumming on the cobbles. At the corner I caught the wall and swung right. I could hear other voices now and singing too. Ahead of me there was a patch of brightness in the fog and as I ran towards it, the patch assembled itself into a tavern – warm and golden with safety.

I thought about dodging inside, but I didn’t have to. The door swung open and three men stepped out into the road. I paused for a moment and watched them. They were laughing – a trio of clerks who’d stopped off for a pint or two before making their way back to their lodgings. One of them unhitched his breeches and pissed up against the wall.

I flattened myself against some railings as his friends waited.

‘You filling up a tin bath there, Charlie? I thought you’d never stop. Away with you now.’

Which way would they go? I crossed my numb fingers.

They turned left. If I tucked in close behind I could follow them down towards Fleet Street.

I pulled my shawl forward to cover half my face and walked quickly to catch them.

I could hear myself breathe – ragged shallow gulps of rancid air that didn’t fill my lungs.

Not far now. I’d take the omnibus going east and I’d be at the theatre within the hour.

Only it wasn’t so simple.

Fleet Street was unnaturally quiet, apart from private carriages and the occasional hack rolling past. If any street buses were out in this, they weren’t going my way.

But I was glad to make out some other people here, as well as my clerks. Grey shapes flitted through the fog – men and women with their heads down and their coats pulled up tight. Home was the only thought in their heads and I couldn’t say as I blamed them.

The street-level windows in most of the buildings, apart from the taverns, were dark blanks and even those above – as far as I could make out – were shuttered up or curtained tight. It was the kind of evening when London gives up on itself, shuts the doors, lights the lamps and closes its eyes. Nanny Peck would have lit the fire on a night like this and made me and Joey sit cross-legged on her old knotted rag rug while she told stories of spirits and banshees.

I shivered. The clammy air was creeping into the folds of my dress and my shawl was beaded with droplets of silver.

I was grateful that the three gents from the tavern turned east and I made sure they were never more than ten foot ahead of me. At first they talked loudly, but as they tramped along they fell silent, stuffed their hands in their pockets and hunched their shoulders.

All the while I listened out for the sound of steps behind me or the rattle and hollow clop of a street bus. I didn’t hear neither. If I’d had money for a hack I would have tried to flag one down, like Lucca that time.

After a few minutes, two of the gents peeled off and headed north. I quickened up so that I could keep the last of them in my sight. We were at Ludgate Hill now, according to the addresses on the fancy shop fronts. There were other stragglers out on the street here too, not many, mind – but enough to make me feel a bit easier. As far as I could tell no one was following. I began to wonder if I’d imagined the sound of the footsteps and the voice in the alley.

The last of the gents turned right down a narrow street into the maze of buildings alongside the river. I thought about following him, but it wouldn’t get me back to Limehouse, would it?

I was going to be badly late now and Fitzy would be waiting. If a street bus didn’t come past soon, I’d be dipping into Mrs C’s paint box tomorrow to cover the bruises.

Then again, maybe The Gaudy wasn’t the first place I should be making for anyway. If I went straight to Lady Ginger’s Palace and told her about Sir Richard Verdin and that painting, perhaps that was enough? Surely she could deal with it on from there with her lascar boys and her Chinamen? They could get the truth out of a man, I was sure.

I thought of Frances and Sukie with their shorn, bloodied heads and terrified eyes. That was The Lady’s mercy.

‘Kitty Peck.’

My name came as a whisper from somewhere very close. At the same moment I felt something brush against my arm. I screamed and pulled away, running blind into the road and into the bank of rolling fog. I couldn’t see more than a yard ahead, but I knew I had to keep going. I ran fast and straight into nothing and now I could hear someone following.

First there were cobbles beneath my feet, then flagstones greasy with fog-lick.

I tripped over a broad stone step and fell forward, throwing out my hands to protect my head and face. My palms slapped down onto other blackened steps rising above me. I gathered my skirt and hurried upwards – five, six, eight steps – until I reached the soot-crusted base of a huge column.

I was standing at the top of the steps to St Paul’s.

Over to the right there was a glow in the fog – a half-open door. I ran across and stepped through into the soft light. I stood for a moment breathing hard and trying to work out where to go when I heard steps on the stones outside.

I darted forward and ran past more columns and gated side chapels where marble tombs and great white statues flickered in candlelight. There were sputtering gas lamps here too, but most of them, if they were working, were turned low.

I slipped behind a column and looked back at the door – a black shadow fell across the threshold.

I could feel my heart bumping about under my ribs like a marble in a bagatelle. The vast cathedral appeared to be deserted. I stepped back and winced as the sound of my heels echoed on the marble floor. I knelt to untie the laces, took off my boots and padded softly across the stones to a large memorial – a military man, I supposed, from the over-buttoned uniform and the lions at his feet. I squeezed behind the plinth, crouched low and kept watch on the side aisle through the gap between his stone boots.

After a few moments I heard footsteps; someone was walking slowly towards me. I peered through the boots. A shadow moved across the floor. About thirty foot away I could see the bottom of a gentleman’s coat and his dark shiny shoes. Then I saw the end of his cane as he probed the space behind a statue.

I couldn’t stay here, he was too near.

I knotted my boots together by the laces and draped them over my shoulders. I slipped out from behind the military type and crawled softly on all fours to the edge of the central aisle. When I was sure he hadn’t heard me I stood up and dodged behind another wide pale column.

St Paul’s was as silent and dead as all the hook-nosed, stone-faced generals standing about the place. It didn’t matter how brave or grand you were in life, I thought, the end was much the same for us all.

A long way ahead somewhere in the forest of pillars a tiny light seemed to be moving about.

A clergy, perhaps, or a watchman?

Careful, deliberate steps sounded over to my right, steps that came closer and closer before moving on past me and further into the dark heart of the cathedral under the dome.

Every nerve and muscle in my body pulled as tight as the strings on Old Peter’s fiddle as I leaned out a little way. The man had his back to me now and was walking away between a row of wooden chairs and more statues. Every so often he bent to check that I wasn’t hiding in the gaps between the high-backed seats and he used the cane to test the spaces. Even in the gloom, his white gloves seemed to glow.

I watched him for a minute. He was well dressed and broad shouldered. I couldn’t see his hair because his collar was turned up and he was wearing a tall hat. I looked back towards the door. I could give him the slip if I managed to get out into the street again.

But then I thought, why not turn the tables, girl? If I could only see his face, just the once, I’d know for sure who he was.

The man with the cane was walking up a central aisle, but there was another to his right and one to his left. If I took the right-hand side and crept up behind him, I’d get a good clear view.

I stepped out from behind the pillar and slipped from shadow to shadow following the man until I was almost level with him.

I could smell his fine cologne – a lot of it, like he’d taken a bleedin’ bath in the stuff, but there was something else too, something bitter, sharp and just as strong. The sort of smell you’d want to mask. A familiar smell too, but I couldn’t place it.

He was less than ten foot away now. Just a few more steps, Kitty.

The clatter of my boots on the stone made me yelp aloud. One of the knots I’d tied had come loose.

I spun about and pelted towards the door, but I could hear him coming after me, his shiny shoes hammering on the marble. I dodged to the left – there was a small door open in the wall. I stepped inside and shut the door quietly behind me, but at almost the same moment I realised how stupid I’d been. Now I was trapped and I’d done it myself.

Perhaps there was something here I could use as a weapon, an old candlestick or a bit of statue? I whirled around. A single gaslight fluttering against the stone wall showed a narrow flight of stairs twisting up into darkness.

There was nowhere else to go. I put my hand to the wall and began to climb.

After making several turns I heard the door below me open; the sound echoed in the stairwell. I began to run.

Three twists later and the stairs ended abruptly on a landing where an open door led off to the right into a dimly lit passage. I raced through the door and along the passage, which broadened out into a wide set of curving steps. Below, the steps coiled into darkness; above, there was a faint light. I didn’t have time to think it through properly – I went where I could see where I was going, winding upwards around and around until my head was swimming. There was no single point to concentrate on here, just endless rising steps.

And then nothing – so much nothing.

I’d come out onto a wide balcony that ran around the inside of the dome. On one side the stone wall curved high above me, on the other a metal rail separated me from the yawning empty space that dropped to the floor of the cathedral yards and yards below. I couldn’t see it, but I could sense the vastness of it.

A gaslight flickered over the door, splashing a little yellow pool over the wall and the rail; the rest of the space was black.

There was a noise from the stairwell. I caught up my skirt and ran out of the light keeping one hand on the rail to guide me round the balcony. I ran until I was opposite the door, barely able to make out its shape across the void.

I stopped, gripped the rail with both hands and stared across. There was a shadow in the light now; a huge shape flickered briefly up the curve of the dome and then disappeared. I heard a door shut and the sound of something like a key turning in a lock.

I took a handful of my shawl and brought it up to my mouth. If I started to cry the sound would bring him straight to me.

I backed away from the rail and flattened my hands against the cool solid wall at my back. Which way would he come?

‘I have you now.’

The words seem to whisper from the stone itself. I sprang forward and whirled about trying to make sense of the noise and the dark, but there was no one there.

Then I heard laughter from the far side of the dome.

A man’s voice, oddly distorted as if to disguise its true sound, rang out across the space.

‘You have discovered one of the marvels of London, Philomel, the whispering gallery beneath the dome of St Paul’s. But you will never be able to tell anyone about it. There is a beautiful irony, is there not, in the fact that the daring Limehouse Linnet will dash her brains out on the cold stone floor of Wren’s masterpiece?’

Bells began to toll. The great black space filled with a tumbling shower of iron and then a single bell counted out the hour. Seven o’clock.

When the last note sounded, it quivered in the air for a long time before the echo faded. Then I heard the cane scraping across the stones. Where was the sound coming from – left or right?

I couldn’t tell. I twisted the ends of my shawl in my hands. I couldn’t afford to make a mistake. If I ran the wrong way now I’d likely run straight into him.

I took a soft step to the balcony and looked over the rail – there was a light moving across the floor a long way below – someone carrying a lamp or a candle. Perhaps if I called out?

I took a breath and was about to shout down, but then I stopped myself. The sound of my voice would bring the man in the shadows straight to me and by the time anyone made it up the winding stairs, I’d be spread out on the marble down below as lifeless as one of them statues.

I twisted the shawl again. The thick plaid had belonged to Nanny Peck. It was good strong stuff, not frayed or torn after all these years. I gripped it tight, thinking of her.

I could still hear the scraping.

Strong stuff.

That was it. I didn’t mind the height, did I? I proved that night after night, right enough. If I could knot the shawl into a loop and tie it to the rail I could hang there, just under the balcony while he passed by. He’d do a full circuit of the dome without finding me. And it would give me time to think.

I unfurled the shawl and tested it. It was long enough to make a swing, but was it strong enough to take my weight?