Kitty Peck and the Music Hall Murders (27 page)

‘This figure, the supplicant, for you, I think. I’ll work straight onto the canvas tonight. They’ll have to be careful when they move it, the paint will be fresh.’ He frowned and looked around. ‘My father will arrange for everything to be cleared as he has arranged for so much else. Power is a wonderful thing, Kitty.’

My father will arrange
. It was the second time he’d referred to his father, but hadn’t James said Edward’s parents were dead?

Chaston smiled coldly. ‘Did you imagine that stupid little Jamie might be a rich man one day, Kitty? Is that why you wanted him?’

He set the paper down on the bench and walked back towards me. ‘My guardian, Sir Richard Verdin, has been like a father to me and in return I am his dutiful son. I keep his secrets and he keeps mine. Together we are formidable. He realised many years ago what James is. The allowance will enable James to ruin himself, to show himself for what he really is – my father has given him a rope by which to hang himself.’

Chaston crouched in front of me. ‘I am the Verdin heir, Kitty, and I will inherit so much.’

They say that madness is carried in the blood, don’t they? That it can be handed down from one generation to another in the way of freckled cheeks, curled hair, crooked teeth or an over-large nose. Edward Chaston taught me an important thing that day, and I often like to think of it now. It’s not blood that counts, it’s nurture. When you raise a child, you shape it like a bit of clay on a potter’s wheel. Every touch of your fingers, every ridge, every groove, every print becomes a part of the finished piece.

Sir Richard Verdin had moulded a child in his own image – whatever that boy saw as he grew to manhood in that bastard’s house, it warped him, twisted him out of human shape and made him wrong. It made him the monster standing in front of me now.

Chaston glanced at the canvas and then back at me. ‘My father is an art-lover too, did you know that?’ He began to laugh quietly as if at some private joke.

‘He is a true connoisseur, although it must be said our tastes . . . differ. Nevertheless, he has taught me much; he has taught me to appreciate the delicate balance between pleasure and pain and he has taught me that the only thing that truly matters is the moment. There is no heaven or hell, Kitty – no Hades.’ He looked over at the painting again. ‘There is only appetite.’

He knelt and began to rub something against the side of his boot. I could hear the scrape of metal against the leather as he continued.

‘To live without conscience is a liberation. Whether in the public domain or in private, it frees you from the petty morality of the masses. It is the precise quality of omission you need to run a business empire – as, one day, I will. My father taught me this lesson well and now he encourages me to develop my own enthusiasms, to seek my own liberation.’

He stood, took a step towards me and grinned, showing those dainty white teeth again. The room swam, but now I could see he was fingering the stubby blade of a knife.

‘Stand up.’

I didn’t move.

‘I said stand.’ Chaston took a knot of my hair again and pulled. The room billowed as I struggled to rise. I managed to kneel but the drug he’d punched into my shoulder had weakened me. There was no fight left now, just a flickering hope that whatever he might be about to do to me, it would be over quickly.

‘Prepare yourself, Miss Peck—’

An odd hollow bumping sound came from somewhere behind him and to the left. Chaston paused as a large glass jar rolled from the shadows beyond the painting. It was un-stoppered and as it circled slowly over the boards it left a trail of glistening gold. It came to a halt against the lower edge of the picture and more liquid pumped out, pooling around it.

Chaston dropped me and ran to the bottle. He set it upright and tried to scoop the spilled liquid up in his hands, forcing it back into the neck. He gasped as he did so, as if it burned his skin. He knelt in front of the painting, scrabbling in the liquid, and his hands were coated in gold to the wrist.

The air was filled with bitter fumes. My eyes began to water and I started to cough. There was a huge crash and the sound of splintering glass as another bottle crashed onto the boards in front of the painting.

Chaston looked up in confusion and then at the broken bottle that had missed his head by inches. A great slick pool of glistening gilt spread around him now like the cloak of a pantomime prince.

And then the fire began.

It happened so fast. The edge caught first – a blue flame danced at the fringe of the golden pool, fizzing and gathering strength as it sucked greedily at the liquid. The flames grew taller, wavering gracefully and shooting off extraordinary colours as they spread swiftly across the surface of the spilled paint. Chaston just knelt there in the centre of the glinting mess. He stared dumbly at the flickering circle of fire around him trying to understand what was happening.

Even when the flames skipped up into his hands like a ball of light he didn’t move, he just looked down at the brilliant, beautiful fire that ate his skin through to the bone in a matter of seconds. It was only then that he began to scream.

‘Fannella!’

Lucca was at my side cutting the ropes that bound my wrists. ‘Try not to breathe it deep into your lungs. It is poison.’

I felt something tingle through my veins bringing strength and sense back to every part of my body. It was hope.

‘There!’

Lucca pulled me to my feet. The room was filling with smoke now. He covered his nose and mouth.

‘Quickly. This way. We’ll have to use the ropes outside.’

‘But you can’t climb.’ I began to choke as smoke filled my throat.

‘I’ll have to. It must be easier going down.’

He pulled me over to the double doors that led out onto the loading platform at the top of the warehouse. He lifted the bolt and rattled one of the doors back, pushing me out onto the wooden boards high above Skinners Yard.

Behind us the room took in a shuddering gulp of air. I could feel it rushing through us as the fire began to feed. Lucca pushed me forward and I caught at one of the ropes dangling from the pulley overhead. I wrapped my legs around it and swung free.

There was a splintering noise from the room. I hung there just off the edge of the platform mesmerised as Edward Chaston’s last painting was consumed in flames. The wide canvas pulsed from side to side with an eerie green light and then, quite delicately, it began to peel away from the burning frame, gracefully folding itself down upon his glowing, jerking form.

‘Go, Fannella!’

I tore my eyes away and began to climb down, feeling the rope pull tight above me as Lucca caught at it too.

As I climbed down I could hear howling. Chaston’s agony ripped into the night air around me. The sound was animal, not human.

Then there was a single gunshot and the screaming stopped.

We stood by the well in Skinners Yard. Looking back, it’s the colours I remember most – green, flecked with sudden spurts of dazzling orange and gold going off like rockets on Guy Fawkes. It was something to do with that paint I supposed, all them medical fluids that Chaston used to make his Sicilian Gold.

The yard began to fill with smoke and even though it made my eyes smart and forced its way deep into my throat, I was rooted to the stones. I couldn’t drag my eyes from the roof timbers of the old warehouse as they burned against the pale dawn sky. Lucca gathered up our boots, grabbed my hand and dragged me into the alleyway. When we got out to the basin we gulped the clean air.

‘How did you get in – how did you find me?’ My words came in ragged gasps.

‘I heard your voice – and the others too.’

Lucca coughed and wiped his mouth. ‘The well – the sounds seemed to echo from the stone. I looked over the edge and saw iron rungs set into the side so I decided to go down a little way. But it’s not a well, Kitty, it’s a sort of chimney with passages leading off towards all the warehouses in the yard. Once I was inside I could hear you speak quite clearly so I knew which opening to take. And then I heard him.

‘The passage opened out into the vaults under Rosen’s warehouse. I think there must have been a fire pit there once. I hid in the shadows and watched as he carried you upstairs and I followed. He was too busy making preparations to notice me as I slipped behind the canvas and it was easy to hide there in the shadow while I thought about what to do.’

I was quiet for a moment.

‘And you shot him?’

Lucca stared at the black water of Limehouse Basin. ‘I did not mean to. At the end it was an act of mercy, even if he was, truly, a Verdin.’

I didn’t say anything, but I knew he was telling the truth. I don’t think I’ll ever forget the sound Edward Chaston made as the paint and the flames consumed him.

‘Fire!’

The shout of warning brought us up sharp. We heard more calls and whistles too as others took up the alarm and then the sound of heavy work boots thundering on stone as men ran towards the flames. We ran too – in the opposite direction, skirting round the basin and shrinking into the shadows to hide from the men rushing towards the blaze.

As we crouched behind some wooden stairs beside one of the warehouse buildings, I gripped Lucca’s arm.

‘I have to go to The Palace. I have to tell The Lady it’s over. I’ve done what she wanted.’

Somewhere behind us there was a huge explosion as the brilliant burning carcass of Rosen’s warehouse collapsed upon its secrets.

Lucca nodded, took my hand and together we fled.

The sky was light overhead as I hammered on the double doors, calling her name. Lucca tried to stop me, but I kept on battering until my knuckles were raw.

‘Give me my brother!’ I shouted that too, over and over, but my voice was hoarse and cracked from the smoke. Soon I was just mouthing the words.

I felt Lucca’s arm about my shoulders. He pulled me round to face him. ‘You must stop this, Fannella. It’s obvious she will not let you in.’

‘Why not?’ I could feel my eyes burning now, but it wasn’t the fire. ‘I’ve done everything she wanted.’

There was a clicking noise behind me as the doors to The Palace opened at last.

But it wasn’t Lady Ginger who looked out at us. She’d sent down another one of her old Chinamen and there were a couple of dark-skinned barrel-chested lascars with him this time.

The Chinaman shuffled forward, hawked some black stuff onto the steps and bowed, first to me and then to Lucca.

‘Lady knows all and is grateful.’

That’s all he said – his peculiar voice was thin and high. He reached into his sleeve just like the last time and knelt to place a square of paper on the step. As he did so I noticed that he never took his hooded black eyes off me. He straightened up, bowed once again, turned his back on us and began to shuffle inside.

‘Grateful! Is that all the old bitch has to say? Well, I’ve got plenty to say to her.’ Lucca caught my sleeve and tried to pull me back, but I darted up the steps and tried to push my way past the Chinaman and into the hall.

‘Joey. I’m here!’ I kept calling out his name as if he was a prisoner in there. I kicked and struggled as the silent lascars closed ranks and blocked the way. From a great distance I heard myself scream and spit and swear at them like an alley cat, as – gently but firmly – they forced me back out and onto the step.

The door closed in my face and I crumpled to the stones. A ringing noise began to fill my head. The sound pulsed and clanged so loudly that I crouched low and covered my ears to block out the pain of it. Then everything went black.

When I woke I was in Lucca’s bed.

Sunlight streamed across the shabby blankets and just above me a fat bluebottle buzzed against the glass of the little window, battering the same pane again and again until it dropped, exhausted, onto the pillow. I brushed it away and sat up. The sudden movement made me cry out and fall back again; my head felt as if it was split in two. Lucca was hunched at the other end of the bed, watching. His arms were wrapped around his knees and his narrow shoulders were level with his ears. He’d pulled his hair back from his face and caught it up at the neck like one of the old-time sailors round the docks. He reminded me of an owl.

‘H . . . how long have I been asleep?’

It was difficult to speak. My mouth was dry and my throat burned.

‘Six hours. And that’s not enough. You need to rest.’

I struggled to get out of the bed, pushing at the tangle of blankets. ‘No. I have to see her. I have to tell her it’s over before it’s too late – Joey . . .’

‘You don’t have to do anything, Fannella.’

Lucca handed me a square of paper. I opened it out and tried to make sense of the black curling lines. My head swam as the writing gradually came together in my eyes. Lady Ginger’s elegant hand looped across the page.

There was an unreadable flourish at the end of these lines – her signature I supposed – and then a postscript.

‘You cannot go alone, Fannella.’

Lucca twisted his hat around again and picked at the frayed band.

‘I have to. That’s what the message said. And I don’t want you following me this time.’ I stared out across the flat, stone-grey water. It’s a funny thing – the Thames is never the same twice, not quite. Sometimes it’s crumpled and green, sometimes heavy mud-brown waves wallop and suck at the stones, sometimes it’s yellow, bound at the edges with a froth of dirty cream lace and sometimes, not often mind, it’s silver-blue and shot through with ripples of light.

I watched as the wooden lid of an old packing crate from the docks floated past the base of the steps. There were some odd, foreign letters stamped diagonal across it in red and next to them a picture of a dog’s head, or perhaps it was meant to be a fox or a wolf.

The lid got caught up in a little eddy of weed and sticks. It twisted round and round in the same spot for a minute or so and then it bobbed free, twirling gracefully away into the smooth silent water. I found myself wondering where it had been and where it was going. That old crate lid had probably seen more of the world than me, I thought. But that was going to change. Once I had Joey back, we were leaving. All three of us were getting out of Paradise – and I didn’t much care where we went next.

I squeezed Lucca’s hand.

‘I’ll be all right. After all, I did everything she wanted, didn’t I? “
You will receive full recompense
”, that’s what Lady Ginger said. Do you think that means she’ll bring Joey with her today now she’s called for me?’

Lucca frowned and picked at the hat band again. ‘Who can tell? For three days you’ve heard nothing and now, this morning, a summons – to that place? At least let me come part of the way – please.’

I shook my head. Tell truth, I wanted to do this alone. Why would The Lady demand to meet me there if she wasn’t bringing my brother? It was probably some twisted joke, I thought, another one of her bleedin’ mind traps – reuniting the Peck family of puppets with a final twitch of the strings. I knew her ways now and I wasn’t frightened no more. All the same, if she really was giving Joey back I wanted him for myself. Just me and him, even for the shortest time, like the old days.

I pushed up closer to Lucca and leaned forward so that I could see his face properly through all that hair.

‘Look. You saved me once already, Lucca Fratelli, and don’t think I’m not grateful that you came after me in that warehouse and . . .’ I broke off. I didn’t want to think about that night, let alone speak of it.

‘Thing is – it’s over. I’ve got to do this on my own. He’s my brother. Do you understand?’

‘But The Lady . . .’ Lucca rolled the brim of his hat over his knees.

‘The Lady is playing a game, putting on a show, that’s all. You know what she’s like.’

Lucca sighed and shifted on the step. ‘As you wish, Fannella.’ He smiled ruefully. ‘At least she has already granted you one thing. Fitzpatrick has been complaining that the takings are down.’

I’d never been to Ma’s grave before. Not since the day we buried her. It was cold then and it was cold now.

I remember the frost covering the mound of earth about to be shovelled back over her coffin after we left. There weren’t many of us there that day. Me, Joey, a couple of Joey’s friends and a legal all got up in shiny black with a tall hat bound with a crêpe band. The trailing ends of the band fluttered about behind his head as he stood there grim-faced and silent.

Joey said afterwards that the legal put him in mind of a beetle. Neither of us knew who he was and we didn’t much care. Tell truth, I suspected he was at the wrong funeral but I couldn’t talk to him. I couldn’t talk to anyone that day.

By the time the vicar had said his piece and Joey had rattled a handful of earth down onto Ma’s box, the man had gone. I reckoned he realised his mistake and felt embarrassed.

That drab winter day was five years ago.

A keen wind whipped down the avenue of cypress trees now as I made my way to her plot. The bell in the little chapel of rest at the entrance had gone off just after I came through the gates. Three strikes. I was early. The Lady wasn’t due until the quarter.

For some reason I’d dressed myself up. Not in one of them bright, blousy outfits I’d bought with Lady Ginger’s purse, but something plain and decent. Dark blue with a high neck, buttons and good gloves. My hair was tied back and away from my face and I was wearing a hat with black feathers at the side and a scrap of net across my eyes. I had Nanny Peck’s shawl pinned around my shoulders too. That seemed the right thing to do.

I counted the avenues until I came to the right one – number 50, west side. Ma’s grave was over to the left somewhere ahead. I remembered the hatchet-faced angel with wrestler’s wings who stood as a perpetual body guard to some poor soul whose family had more money than taste.

We couldn’t afford a stone for Ma. But I remembered at the service there was a wooden cross with her name on a tin plate stuck into the earth mound at a jaunty angle. I thought they’d use it as a marker after we’d gone and I looked for it now.

I didn’t feel sentimental about the spot. As far as I was concerned she wasn’t there. Anyone who’s been at the deathbed of someone they love will tell you the same. One minute there’s a person with you, next minute they’re gone. It’s like a candle flame going out and the sudden absence is shocking. But there’s an odd sort of comfort in that because you know they must have gone somewhere else.

I don’t claim to be a divinity but one thing I do know is that Ma, the best of her, went off somewhere that night and she wasn’t here with me now in the cemetery.

I stepped off the gravel path and walked along the tree-lined row beyond the winged prize-fighter. It was one of these, I was certain.

Henry Trott had a nice big stone with a carving of a flaming urn set into the top. It came back to me now. Ma’s grave was three plots further along. I paused, confused. They all had stones here – fine ones at that. Not a single grave in this row had a simple wooden cross.

I stepped forward to check. After Henry Trott came Martin Benyon, brewer, then Hannah Dyson, beloved wife and mother, then Mary Clifford – a pillar the size of a man, but not much more there than her name and a couple of dates – and then a tall grey triangular block set on a plinth. Simple it was, but elegant, the corners carved sharp and clean. Must have cost someone a year’s wage, but they’d set it up in the wrong place. This was Ma’s grave. I was sure of it.

There was some lettering on the base hidden by greenery. I knelt down and pushed the leaves and grass aside.

Elizabeth?
Ma’s name had been Eliza. I tugged at the weeds growing up round the base of the stone and a clump came away from the ground, roots and all.

elizabeth redmayne
1836–1875
beloved daughter and mother
she took little but was owed much

Redmayne? I straightened up and stared at the stone. It was good work, quality marble, beautifully cut letters filled in gold. The dates were right too, but the name was all wrong. If this was a mistake it was an expensive one. I clenched my fist over the weeds, furious that some family had taken Ma’s grave and planted a stone to a stranger on top of it.