The Last Confession of Thomas Hawkins (22 page)

The more I considered Ned’s story, the more I doubted he was the killer. With Burden dead, he’d lost any hope of being recognised as his son. Stephen might be weeping in his room, and Judith was swigging opiates to dull her senses, but it seemed to me that Ned was the most affected by Burden’s murder. No chance for reconciliation. No chance to make his father proud. Strange, that of all Burden’s children, it was Ned – his bastard – who loved him the most.

‘I’m afraid for his soul, Mr Hawkins,’ he said, as he escorted me to the door. ‘The manner of his death – it gave him no chance to repent his sins. He was not himself, these past few weeks. His treatment of Alice . . .’

I could hear Mrs Jenkins fussing over Stephen upstairs. They would never winkle her out of the house now – not unless someone more interesting was murdered. The queen should have hired Mrs Jenkins to investigate Charles Howard instead of me – the woman was a walking newspaper, crammed with gossip.
The Daily Jenkins
. Still, she would be a help too, with Alice gone. ‘Is it true that Alice has run away?’

Ned glanced up the stairs. ‘Judith threw her out. I warned her not to be so rash. And now you are released . . .
Alice
.’ He laughed without humour, marvelling at the thought. ‘I can scarce believe it, but she had most cause . . .’

I shook my head. Burden had been torturing Alice for weeks in secret. Why kill him now, when he had promised to marry her? Kill him after the ceremony, perhaps, when the ink upon his will was dry. But not before. I took the knife from my pocket. ‘Your father was stabbed nine times in the chest. That was rage. Revenge.’

His eyes widened. He tore the blade from my hand. ‘How d’you know that?
How d’you know he was stabbed nine times?
’

I shrank back, realising my mistake. How could I know, indeed, if I had not seen the corpse? ‘Half the town knows it!’ I protested, feigning indignation. But I sounded nervous, even to my own ears – and Ned was suspicious once more.

‘You were angry with him last night. And very drunk.’

So, we were back to this. Damn it. ‘The doors and windows were barred. I’m not a ghost, Ned. I cannot walk through walls.’

‘Perhaps there’s another way in.’ He paused, narrowing his eyes. ‘Alice said she thought there must be a passage between the houses . . .’

Thank God I played cards for profit. My face was a mask, but my heart was thudding so hard against my chest I was sure he must see it beating through my coat. Heaven help me – if Ned found the passage between the two attic rooms, I was lost without a hope. I clamped my hat to my head. ‘There are no doors and no passages. Whoever killed your father is still here in this house, Ned. If I were you, I should sleep with that blade beneath your pillow.’

Chapter Twelve

The Cocked Pistol was open for business. I watched from the street for a time, recovering my wits and savouring the last thin light of a long, cruel day. Business was steady, despite my ignominious arrest, customers entering with their usual furtive slide. Sam had taken charge of the shop. He was well suited to the task, swift and discreet – and the customers didn’t notice him studying them closely beneath lowered lids. Perhaps later in his room he would sketch that young servant, come to collect a fresh parcel of books. One of Lord Hervey’s men, I thought. His lordship was a great friend of the Prince of Wales. As he often ordered two copies of the same volume, we’d begun to suspect that one set was being smuggled to Prince Frederick for his pleasure and education. What would his mother think of that? Perhaps she would be pleased. It was vital the boy knew how to breed, after all.

Sam handed over the parcel and pocketed the small tip. For all the trouble he had caused with his moonlight skulks about Burden’s house, I had grown oddly fond of the boy. Fond enough to dismiss the notion that he could have killed Burden. Reason told me I should not discount him – the son of a murderous gang captain, the nephew of a master assassin. But I could not believe him capable of such a violent, bloody murder. And for what purpose – sport? No, Burden’s killer had been seeking revenge or justice. I doubted Sam had much time for either.

Burden’s children were another matter entirely. The more I considered the life they had endured, the more certain I was that one of them was guilty. Burden had kept Judith a prisoner all her life; she rarely left the house save for church. Well – she was free now. I glanced up at the windows, shuttered in mourning. I had seen her sitting there countless times, pale and drawn, watching hungrily as life passed beneath her gaze. ‘Poor Judith’, the gossips had called her, while Felblade delivered another draught for her nerves.

Stephen must have dreaded a similar fate, once his father refused to send him back to school. He’d been given a sharp taste of his new life – beaten half to death for daring to question his father’s authority. And then, bitterest of all, he had discovered his father was not only a violent bully, but a liar and a hypocrite. Had this been enough to kindle a murderous fury in the boy? That thin-limbed, trembling colt? Rage could give the weakest soul the strength of ten men. Cut off from his school and his friends, with his inheritance in peril, Stephen had powerful reasons to murder Burden. Money, justice, revenge. Of the three children, he would gain the most from his father’s death. Now
he
was master of the house – and free to live as he pleased.

Freedom for Judith, freedom for Stephen. In another world I would have walked away from the whole damned business – let God stand in judgement when all was done. But I had my own freedom to consider. My own precious neck.

I must press a confession from one of them, or at least discover some clear proof of guilt. The blade had been found with the corpse, but what of the killer’s ruined, bloody clothes? There would have been no chance to destroy them today, not with half the neighbourhood trailing through the house offering condolences. The clothes must still be hidden somewhere inside, and would remain there unless one of the children attempted to smuggle them out. One could hardly drop them upon the drawing-room fire.

I rolled my aching shoulders, glad to have found one small thread of hope. I would seek permission to search the house thoroughly tomorrow. In the meantime . . . A couple of tattered street boys stood outside the baker’s shop. Doubtless they might keep watch for a few halfpennies and a couple of Mrs Jenkins’s rolls. I crossed the street towards them, but they squealed as I approached, scampering away before I could explain myself. It was a melancholy moment. I was a monster now, was that it? And I felt a shiver in my soul, some pre-sentiment that more trouble lay ahead. Once a man was named a monster, the mob was rarely far behind.

Sam, at least, seemed pleased to see me returned safe from the lock-up – in his fashion. He clambered over the counter and took my hand, shaking it without a word. I showed him the order and his face took on an expression of awe. ‘The City Marshal’s hand,’ he murmured, brushing the paper as if it were the finest silk.

I plucked it back. He liked to practise different hands when it was quiet in the shop. ‘What’s the sentence for counterfeiting a Marshal’s note?’

Sam looped an imaginary rope about his neck and pretended to hang, swaying on the spot with his tongue hanging out. It was a little too convincing for comfort.

‘How many hangings have you seen, Sam?’

‘Hundreds. Saw Jack Sheppard nubbed. Stood beneath the cart.’

I’d seen Sheppard swing too – my first winter in London. The mob had loved him, pulling on his legs to help speed his passing. It had ended in a riot, his friends fighting to keep his body from the chirurgeons. Thousands upon thousands streaming through the streets, trampling everything in their path. I’d thought I would die in all that madness and had wished myself safe at home in Suffolk. When I survived, pulled clear by strangers into the nearest tavern, my shirt torn and my lip bloodied, I knew I never wanted to leave.

‘Thomas Hawkins. Oh, you wretch.’ The door slammed back upon its hinges. Kitty: face smudged, clothes damp with sweat despite the cold. ‘Look at you! Look at you here without a care in the world when I am half
dead
. I’ve trudged the streets all day searching for you. Every gaol, every lock-up. They laughed at me, Tom. They laughed and jeered and groped . . . How long have you been free? Oh! You cannot even
guess
how much I hate you, you thoughtless prick
.
’

‘I thought you were safe.
Sam.
You were supposed to take her to St Giles.’

He lifted a shoulder. ‘She weren’t inclined.’

‘
She
,’ Kitty said, whisking up and down the shop in a blind fury, ‘has just returned from Gonson’s house. That fucking guard who did this,’ she pointed at a bruise on her cheek. ‘He kept me waiting half an
age
, then said you were set free hours ago. Said you’d left with your
black whore
.’ She kicked over a stool. ‘He said you kissed her, in front of the
whole world
. Did you . . .? Oh, you villain – you
did
kiss her!’

‘Well, no, not precisely,’ I flustered. ‘She did somewhat
rather
 . . .
but she only kissed me to distraction.
For
distraction, that is.
For
distraction. A slip of the tongue.’

‘
A slip of the tongue
,’ Kitty mimicked nastily. ‘And I suppose your tongue just
slipped
into Betty’s mouth?’

‘Oh damn it, Kitty – it was an act, that is all. If you would let me explain . . .’ I reached for her, but she evaded my grasp, leaving the shop and running up the stairs.

I glanced up at the ceiling. ‘Well, Sam. I suppose I had better meet my fate.’

He grinned. Wrapped the rope around his neck and swung back and forth.

Kitty was lighting a fire in our room. She heard me enter and sit down upon the bed, but she didn’t turn around until the hearth was blazing. She took off her cap and unpinned her hair, tossing her head so the curls bounced down her back. She knew I loved that.

‘Am I forgiven?’ I took off my wig and slung it in a corner. I was too tired to argue. Too tired to move. My limbs ached from the lock-up, and my mind was distracted, bouncing from thought to thought like a racket ball.

‘
Betty
.’ She loosened the ribbons to her gown and pulled out the stomacher beneath, exposing the soft parting of her high, round breasts.

And suddenly, my mind was still.

‘D’you want her, Tom?’ She slipped off her shoes and balanced a foot upon my thigh. Slid it higher.
Ahh
 . . .
She rolled down her stocking. ‘I’ve seen the way she looks at you. Like this.’ She parted her lips and stared down at me from lowered lids.
Need. Desire.

‘Oh, fie – plenty of women look at me like that. That is—’

Kitty snorted and rolled down another stocking, flinging it at my face. ‘No, no – true enough. Half the town wants to fuck you and the other half wants to hang you.’

I kicked off my shoes. ‘And you would like to do both, I suppose.’

She clambered on to the bed, unfastening the buttons on my breeches. And then she kissed me, a kiss of possession. She slipped her hand lower, pulled my cock free. ‘Say you are mine,’ she murmured. ‘Mine alone.’

‘I’m yours.’

She smiled. Oh, I wanted her. I wanted her now. No more waiting. I rolled her beneath me, pushing her gown high above her hips.
Yes, yes, yes.
I lay over her, placed all my weight upon my shoulders.

Fuck!
The pain ripped through my muscles and I fell back against the bed, panting hard.

‘Tom?’ Kitty sat over me. ‘You’re hurt?’