The Dolocher (18 page)

The next killing followed not long after the boar was displayed to all at Cornmarket just as Alderman James had feared. He had known by the face of Mary Sommers that they did not have their killer. He went to her that afternoon at her home, and both she and another victim told him that the boar was not the Dolocher. As he made his way to the site of the murder James was already aware of who the victim was; it was the gaoler at Newgate Prison James Brick and it was the one person who could have been killed who could reignite the nonsense of revenge from beyond the grave by Thomas Olocher.

The body was as badly mutilated as the delivery man Cleaves’ had been, limbs and stomach torn to shreds and the face all but smashed into the skull, brains and skull spattered around the ground about the head. Edwards as always was standing nearby, but James wanted to talk to the soldiers first for their version of events, if there was any. There wasn’t much to go on apparently; the guards at the gaol said that Brick left without saying anything at about midnight as he did sometimes, and they saw no more of him after that. The body was found in a tiny alley at Cutpurse in front of some businesses that were closed for the night and so yet again there were no witnesses to the attack, some people a street to either side had heard a short sharp scream but nothing after that.

James then went over to Edwards to see what he had to say.

“The gaoler,” James said

“The perfect person to keep the rumours alive,” Edwards replied. As he said this James suddenly thought that Mary Sommers would have suited this role as well and he called a soldier over and ordered him to go and patrol the street where she lived until daybreak and to report anything he thought was suspicious. Edwards listened and then said,

“You think she will be targeted again?”

“I do now. There is something that feels staged about this, something almost theatrical, and the perfect way to go from here would be to kill Mary Sommers.”

“A definite human mind behind what you propose,” Edwards said

“I have felt so all along but I let what I saw that night I chased him cloud my judgment.”

“What motive could there be behind all this killing? Some of the people were linked to Thomas Olocher, but the rest have seemed almost random.”

“That’s what is so hard to say. I have searched high and low for any relatives or friends of Olocher that might have had reason to feel they were avenging him, but I have come up with nothing. He seemed to have no friends and no family.”

“My own searches have come to the same conclusion.”

“So why would anyone want to carry on in his name?”

“Maybe they aren’t but people are just reading into it that way?”

“No, I think if he wanted to be known for what he was doing he would have changed his killing method once the rumours of the Dolocher started to spread.”

“On another note, and to confuse things further there is something I think you should know about.” How could things get any more confused James thought,

“What?”

“The blacksmith, Mullins, has been out wandering the streets at all hours the last few nights, and he is not going to taverns but just walking all the streets where the killings have taken place.”

“Why is he doing that? Him of all people!”

“He says he is going to catch the Dolocher,” Edwards smiled

“He’ll get himself killed or worse still people will be convinced now that he is the killer, and he will be killed by a mob.”

“He has his own theory as to who the killer is,” Edwards grin grew even wider now

“Who?” James asked; eyebrows arched.

“Me.”

“Why does he think that?”

“He has seen me out on the streets at night and I get the impression that he doesn’t like the look of me one bit.”

James’s own doubts about Edwards resurfaced here, and he thought again about how he knew more than he let on. It was possible that he was indeed the killer, he was always out in the middle of the night and he had plenty of places he could hide after he killed but then hadn’t he been with James when one of the murders was committed, Again it came down to the idea that Edwards was an accomplice at best and if that was the truth there was no way that the Dolocher was ever going to be revealed and brought to justice unless James or Mullins or a victim was able to catch him and overpower him.

“Well, this paranoia will get the better of most people,” James said, “There are some who probably think I am the killer for the same reason,” and as he said this he wondered if it might not be true; and why not him Alderman Level Low, he’s killed before hasn’t he? Multiple weavers and who knows how many else? He realised for the first time, and as he did he was dumbfounded by his own naiveté, that if he didn’t catch this killer he was going to be associated with it; the Alderman who walked the streets at night, who was always around when the murders were committed. Was there no end to the bloodlust of this man? How could he have been so silly as to not to have been able to see how guilty he could look in the eyes of the very people he was trying to redeem himself with. The idea of rumours, the same thoughts he had about Edwards, now came to him. If the Alderman is not the Dolocher, he knows who is, and he is protecting him. He saw the faces of the men in the whisky cabin on Cook street who left the free tables around him and didn’t want him in their company-he’d thought it was because he was a man of the law but it was because they were afraid of him and what he might do to them if he came across them at night on their way home, or what whoever he was protecting would do to them. If the law was the murderer who was ever going to be able to do anything about it?

“This Brick fellow used to sneak out to meet a woman,” Edwards said and James snapped back to the moment.

“Sorry?”

“Brick leaves the prison a few nights a week to see a woman, the tale goes that she is paying off her husband’s debts in another way to keep him out of prison.”

“Who is this woman?”

“I’m not sure of the name yet, but she lives in Wormwood, and that is probably where he was going tonight.”

“That would make sense I suppose.”

“You don’t seem interested in this information?”

“I'm not really, if he does this a few times a week he could have been observed many times by the killer and easily targeted.”

“You don’t think the husband might be a suspect?” James looked at Edwards

“For all the crimes or just this one?” he asked

“That’s what I was wondering now myself. We find the name of the woman, and that leads us to the man and then we can see who he is and what he is about.”

“Worth a try I suppose,” The Alderman was still thinking of his own guilt and his own stupidity.

Mullins could feel the many eyes on him as he approached the shed he was told Lord Muc was in. The atmosphere of distrust and fear was palpable, and men fidgeted as they pretended to focus on the tasks they were doing. Mullins got to the doorless frame and knocked on the wood but did not go in.

“What is it?” a harsh voice called out.

“It’s the blacksmith,” Mullins called in “I want to talk.”

“Come in.”

Mullins stepped inside to what looked like a makeshift workshop. Some of what he saw he recognised as poor variations on his own work tools and equipment and the rudiments of any other numbers of trades. There were animal skins and fabrics spread about in one corner; weapons and farming tools in another. Piles of scrap steel and wood lay strewn about the floor, leaving almost walkways between them like those in a well-trod field or forest. Lord Muc had his back to Mullins, and he was hammering on something. Mullins stopped about ten paces from him and waited.

“What is it you want?” Lord Muc asked when he stopped banging, he lifted a metal looking ball on the end of a club; it seemed to Mullins that he had been just knocking some sharper points into the metal to be used as a mace of sorts.

“I want you to help me catch the Dolocher,” Lord Muc turned at this and a broad smile spread over his face.

“We already tried that; I lost a few good fighters that night and with fuck all to show for it in the end,” he said as though the memory was funny to him.

“I’m not asking for another rampage, just some of your people to help me patrol some nights.”

“And what's in that for me?”

“Anyone of your men could be killed as things stand on any night, and you yourself have been harassed by the soldiers thinking you are the killer.”

“My men can look after themselves and as long as you are around I’ll never be the chief suspect for the killings.”

“So you won’t help me?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Then what are you saying?”

“Join us, and you’ll get all the help you need,” Lord Muc looked at him steely eyed and seriously. Mullins stopped a moment; he had partly expected this but hoped it wouldn't come to it.

“Help me for a week and I’ll join you in one of your fights.”

“Not good enough.”

“Five nights?”

“I’ll give you three this week if you fight with us next Saturday morning.”

“Fair enough,” Mullins said and he knew he had gotten less than he would have liked from the bargain.

“If I help you win well, I get a week of help afterwards,” he demanded

“You’ll get help based on how you perform.”

Kate was in the brothel on Friday night when Mr. Edwards came in and beckoned her over. She looked to Melanie, who nodded for her to leave her current customer and go to Edwards. When she got over to him he said,

“You’re coming with me to my house.”

“I’ll have to ask Mel...”

“No time for that, just come on,” he said, and he pulled her by the arm out of the brothel and out to the street and into his carriage. There was something different about him tonight Kate thought, but it was that drunken moodiness he sometimes had. She wanted to ask him what was wrong, but she was afraid of his getting angry.

“I hear you have been seeing a lot of the blacksmith,” he said after a few minutes silence. She looked at him, but he was looking out the opposite window.

“A little,” she said knowing from the past that there was little point in lying to this man who seemed to know everything that was going on in the city no matter how trivial.

“I need you stay away from him from now on.”

“What? Why?”

“I just need you to do it.”

“Not without a reason,” she said, she was angry that he thought he could control her life outside of his use of her as a prostitute.

“It’s for your own safety.”

“I’m perfectly safe with him, damned more than I ever am with you,” she said and now he did look at her.

“You think you are safe with the Dolocher?” he said and there was no sneering smile that made what he said all the more scary. Mullins was the Dolocher? He had the build and the strength? But... No! Why was she letting him make her think like this? She knew who he was, what he was.

“What are you talking about, he is the most gentle creature there is.”

“That’s what's so suspicious, when he is working, and sober he is as meek as a mouse but when he gets a few drinks in him or his anger is up he is vicious and loses control at the drop of a hat.”

“I know he has fights in the taverns sometimes but what man doesn’t do that?”

“Listen Kitty, I have thought him innocent along the way but I have my doubts now, and I can’t shake the idea that you are in danger around him.”

At this her heart jumped, and she grew nervous. Did Edwards have feelings for her? It was more than she was capable of not to think of herself living in the warmth and opulence of his home. And at once she felt she was betraying Mullins for whom feelings had grown organically over time and much to her own surprise. Her heart was pounding as she didn’t hear what he said next, but she knew he was saying something, she looked at him, saw his mouth move and his eyes as he looked on her-was there anything in those eyes? There was but what it was would have been impossible to detect and decipher.

“What did you say?” she asked

“I said I will get you into the brothel full time so you won’t have to walk the streets anymore.”

“I don’t want to be in the brothel seven nights a week!” she said and this was the first she knew of it and the first that she found that she must have assumed that Mullins was going to take her as his wife someday and that she wouldn’t have to work as she did now; would not be able to work as she did now, and that the brothel was now something that caused a send in her stomach that was pure revulsion.

He was looking at her now with an odd look as though she were mad or had said something totally unexpected.

“You are happy to walk the same streets where people are being killed all the time?”

“No,” she said but didn’t know where to go from there.

“I see,” Edwards said and now he did smile, that sarcastic smile he had that tinged on evil and made him so unpredictable.

“What do you see?” she asked insulted.

“You think he will marry you.” He was right, and though she said no with her face she knew he knew he was right. “You think anyone would marry a prostitute?” the sneer thickened momentarily and then fell into a piteous face.

“Plenty have before,” she retorted lamely.

“If this blacksmith is as good man as you claim then why on earth would he marry a common tart?”

“I think you better let me out here,” she said not looking at him, she was furious and more so because part of her knew that he could be right, probably
was
right. She knew what was intimated between Mullins and herself, but it was something that had gone unsaid, something that didn’t necessarily have to come to pass, a future unwritten. He could decide that he couldn’t marry a street walker despite how she knew he felt right now; he was clouded by the first woman of his life and Kate knew that love or the illusion of it can be thicker than any winter fog and could lift just as quickly.

“I’m not finished with you yet,” he said

“I don’t care; I want to get out.”

“If you leave this carriage you will never work in that brothel ever again, or any brothel for that matter!” he snapped at her.

In that instant she saw a light open up, and the beams of chance came shining through. If she was put out of the brothels would that not be the first step to being something else, someone else? She would have no choice but to do something else as she couldn’t live with what she made on the streets alone. She could see herself telling Mullins that she was quitting the life she led; he didn’t have to know she was being forced out of it or that she was doing it in the hope of a better life with him. Should she get out or stay and degrade herself with this wild and dangerous man to keep sure of food on her table? The light was too strong,

“Let me out, please.”

Edwards looked at her with what she read as disappointment before tapping the roof of the carriage and shouting for the driver to stop and let the lady out (he called her lady.) When she stepped down to the ground he caught her arm and she turned to look at him.

“Be careful, nobody knows who the Dolocher is” and there seemed to be genuine concern in his face and his voice-he was so hard to understand.

“I will be Mr. Edwards” she said quietly and she stood there a moment as the carriage pulled away into the night towards the Liffey to cross over to that house where she had fleeting fantasies of living, where she would have been warm and safe tonight. She looked around and wondered what to do and then she walked briskly along the most populated routes back to the brothel.