The Mourning Bells (26 page)

“There’s no harm in them, is there? In fact, you’ve already seen them work twice in recent days.” He rubbed his palms together. Violet wondered how badly he was perspiring beneath his corset. “You’ve made a mistake in accusing me. I think perhaps I should lodge a complaint with—who were they?—Hirsch and Katt over your harassment of a man as well respected as I am.”

From across the room, Mrs. Harrison was weeping and snuffling again, the jewelry tray’s interesting contents forgotten in her lap. Upton contemplated Violet sadly as though she were responsible for his customer’s renewed outburst. “As you can see, I have a customer who needs me. If you would please find your own way out . . .”

Upton hurried away from Violet, slowing as he approached Mrs. Harrison and opening his tentacles wide as if welcoming her for the first time. “Ah, I see you are admiring the Beautiful Memories ring, an excellent choice. You will be able to insert not only styled hair under the dome, but some lovely pearls and miniature ribbons. You can remember your sister as she used to be, before the unfortunate incident . . .”

Violet moved to the door. This was the second time in three days that she’d been thrown out of an undertaker’s shop. Would her reputation suffer from all of her snooping and accusations? Perhaps she should visit Hurst tomorrow morning about Upton and ask the detective to make an
actual
visit to the undertaker. Hurst would be far better at extracting a full confession from the man.

As she gently opened the shop’s door to let herself out, careful not to let the bells jangle too much and draw attention to herself, Violet reflected upon the fact that she needed to improve her skills of interrogation and accusation. For the moment, she was proving to be a dismal failure at it.

Not only that, something was bothering her. It was something Upton had said—what was it? It had been important, perhaps critical, to the situation. She shook her head, unable to remember, but wondering if it further bolstered the case against him . . . or established his innocence.

 

Back at home, Sam had left a note for her. He and some new banker were taking the train to Nottinghamshire to walk over the coalfield Sam wanted to purchase. It was the closest Sam had gotten to a “yes” with one of the finance men. He would return on the morrow.

Mildly irritated that her husband wasn’t there for counsel, especially given her upset state, Violet paced back and forth inside her bedchamber. At dinnertime, she refused Mrs. Wren’s meal to the cook’s great annoyance, instead requesting that tea and toast be brought to her, which were produced with grumbling and a sour look.

Violet drank the tea and nibbled halfheartedly at the toast, which she knew would vex Mrs. Wren even more. It wasn’t often that Violet refused plates set before her. However, Mrs. Wren’s temper and her own waistline were irrelevant at the moment. Violet needed to think.

She had been so sure Upton was guilty, but as usual, now she was uncertain. Just as she had been suspicious of Crugg, Vernon, and Ambrose. She was running out of suspects. Twenty minutes of hair brushing didn’t calm her mind or help her to see things any more clearly.

Hours later, restless and unable to sleep, Violet retrieved her copy of
Lorna Doone
from the bookshelf in the parlor. Ruth had made great headway on returning the room to normal upon Susanna’s departure. Mrs. Softpaws was even at ease enough to have made her bed on the settee, where she now lay curled up in a tight ball. Other round spots of fur on the other chairs in the room proved that the cat was probably quite comfortable now that she had so much space to call her own with Susanna and Benjamin gone.

With the book under one arm, Violet stopped to scratch behind the ears of the sleeping cat, which she’d found as a kitten, loitering outside the basement door of the townhome she’d shared with her first husband. She smiled to think of how she used to parade about the streets of London with the orphaned waif Susanna, who would walk the young cat on a lead. Violet had been an oddity then, and she supposed she still was now.

Mrs. Softpaws’s fur wasn’t as thick and luxurious as it used to be, probably due to the cat’s aging. Violet sighed in sympathy. The cat looked up at her so sleepily and incoherently, it was as if she’d been drugged.

Violet’s hand stopped in midscratch, eliciting a cross between a meow and a yawn from the feline. She wasn’t sure what was racing faster, her heart or her mind, as she quickly put together everything in her head. She now understood everything: what had happened with the bodies at Brookwood, what the circumstances were surrounding Roger Blount, why Margery Latham had died, and why Julian Crugg had been murdered.

It was a ghastly, horrific chain of events, and she had been completely blind to the obvious. How could she have missed the unmistakable clues that had loomed so large in her path that she should have been tripping over them?

“Thank you, Mrs. Softpaws,” Violet said gratefully, giving the cat a final scratch under the chin. “You’ve been very helpful.”

V
iolet stood outside the door, nervously mustering up the courage to knock.

After a sleepless night, she had finally risen around eight o’clock, dressed quickly, and, on a whim, removed a fish knife from the kitchen while Ruth was puttering around in the study. Then she had raced to Scotland Yard to rouse Inspectors Hurst and Pratt with her explanation of what had happened.

The two men weren’t in yet but would be within the hour, the desk sergeant told her. Violet had paced for several minutes while debating what to do, and finally decided that there was already too much risk that the murderer had left town and wouldn’t be stopped.

She told the desk sergeant where she was going, leaving a message for Inspector Hurst to meet her there.

Had she been foolish not to wait for the detectives before coming here?

There was no help for it now. Violet put her hand inside her reticule to assure herself that the short but wide blade that regularly cut through fillets of haddock and trout was still there.

Would she be able to cut through human flesh with it if someone tried to murder her? She wasn’t sure. She had spent her adult life caring for bodies, not destroying them.

Finally summoning the will to do so, Violet rang the bell but received no answer. Hearing movement from within, though, she tried the door latch, which gave way easily. She pushed the door open and stepped over the threshold.

A small travel trunk lay open on the desk, half filled with books, papers, and medical supplies. Should Violet really be surprised that he was gathering up his valuables to leave town? Where was he planning to go? America, maybe? Australia? A remote, deserted island?

A door at the back of the room opened, and he stepped out, carrying a vial full of caramel-colored liquid littered with oddly shaped flakes and wearing an expression of surprise at seeing Violet standing there. In the moments that the door was open, Violet saw what she had expected behind him: several coffins, a portable examination table, and the tools of the anatomist’s trade. She steeled herself for what was to come.

“Mrs. Harper, what a surprise to see you again so soon.” He tossed the vial into the trunk and went to a bookcase, searching through the shelves until he found a stack of papers, which he also added to the trunk.

“Are you going somewhere?” she asked.

“Just a little holiday. I’ve been working entirely too hard.”

That was an interesting way of characterizing the murder of at least four people, if not many more. He continued to toss items into the trunk.

“Were you successful in your investigation?” he wanted to know.

“Yes, although not in the manner that I expected. I had time to think things over last night and realized that I hadn’t been pursuing matters in the most fruitful way possible.” She stared directly at him, daring him to hold her gaze. He dropped his almost immediately, returning to his packing.

“It was last night, as my daughter’s cat looked up at me from where she lay sleeping, that I realized it all. Does that surprise you, sir? That a feline held the answer? It’s true, Mr. Ambrose. It made me realize how you were transporting the bodies to Brookwood. Before you killed them, of course.”

Ambrose stopped what he was doing and glanced up with a look of near admiration. “Is that so?”

He came from around the desk and locked the door. It bolted with a disturbing finality. His smile as he turned back to face her was equally disturbing. “I see no point in dissembling, madam. I must compliment you on not being thrown too far off the scent when I sent you to Augustus Upton. He’s so odious that I was certain you’d be chasing him for at least the next week.”

“My apologies for disappointing the good doctor.” Violet felt her pulse racing beneath her skin. What was he going to do next? To her relief, he went back to packing, removing some items and substituting them with others. It seemed a random mix of belongings, but who knew what went on in the mind of a murderer?

“And what did your dear kitty tell you?” he asked lightly, although Violet was certain he was trying to determine if she really did know anything.

“It was what I noticed in her. She was sleepy, and it reminded me of someone who has been administered a sleep tonic. That made two things jump out at me.”

Ambrose flipped through a medical book, as if considering whether to take it or not. “And what two things were they?”

“I remembered finding a bottle of laudanum among Mr. Crugg’s belongings. At the time, I assumed he took it himself, given how high-strung he was.”

“Hmm, a reasonable assumption, Mrs. Harper.”

“Yes, but now I know that wasn’t true. When I went to see Mr. Upton yesterday, he commented to me that he wished he had laudanum to give to his more hysterical customers, to calm them. After seeing Mrs. Softpaws in such a tranquil state last night, I realized that Crugg’s laudanum wasn’t for himself but for calming his customers. His customers inside coffins, that is. Crugg obtained the laudanum from you, didn’t he?”

“There are hundreds of places to purchase the drug. He didn’t need me to give it to him.” Ambrose seemed unperturbed by what Violet said, addressing her condescendingly, as if she were a mere child. “So you think he was embalming them with it? How could Crugg possibly be administering opium tinctures to corpses?”

“He wasn’t, sir. He was offering it to living people on your behalf. Instead of the usual dose that would be used to suppress a cough or calm someone’s nerves, you instructed Crugg to give a dose that, while not fatal, would ensure unconsciousness for a period of time. With their slowed breathing, the bodies could endure the hour or two necessary inside the coffin to make the trip to Brookwood without running out of fresh air. Also, they wouldn’t experience the panic that comes from being shut inside a cramped box like that.

“You couldn’t ask for air holes to be drilled into the sides of the coffin, lest your cabinetmaker be suspicious, so you had to be sure the body could survive with just the coffin’s air. Ironic, isn’t it, that with so many safety coffins available, you couldn’t use most of them, lest some unsuspecting railway worker—or nosy undertaker—notice a living body inside too soon.”

“That’s quite an interesting theory.” The doctor sat down in the chair behind his desk, pushing the trunk to one side so that he could fully view Violet. “You seem to be quite astute. Why don’t you tell me the rest of your thesis? I’m sure it is every bit as fascinating as this fabrication about laudanum.” He smiled, and it reminded her of a wolf salivating over a heedless doe that was stepping precariously close to him.

Violet began pacing, her usual nervous activity as she thought through a knotty problem.

“I think that a banker, specifically Mr. Cyril Hayes of East London Bank, was informing you of aristocratic young men whose debts were considerable, but who still had plenty of assets that could be easily turned into cash. For a fee, he referred them to you, although some, like Roger Blount, found you on their own. You helped them devise an escape, as they were ostensibly dying, but in reality they would end up going south, perhaps ultimately to Spain or France. I imagine the rumors of these men being spotted on trains were merely a happy coincidence of gossipy reporters stretching the truth to come up with stories.”

“I see,” he said, leaning back in the chair.

“The desperate dodger would first transfer his assets into your name. You would sign a fake death certificate and arrange for the dodger to go to Julian Crugg, who, for another fee, would enact the charade of a workman’s funeral, then drug the client enough to make the journey to Brookwood inside the coffin comfortable.”

Ambrose’s smug expression told Violet that she had guessed correctly.

“You would meet the coffin, usher it off the platform to your office, then help the dodger start his new life. But your plans took a darker turn.”

The doctor raised an expectant eyebrow but still said nothing.

“I had suspected Mr. Upton early on, but was not truly led to him until your misleading suggestion. I also suspected James Vernon, as I know he is a very sloppy undertaker and might have been responsible for shipping off live bodies, not realizing they were dead. Even you, sir, passed through my list of suspects. But it was only last night that I realized it all. I should almost congratulate you on such a cleverly executed plan and your calm demeanor. If not for Mr. Crugg’s death, which removed him from my list of suspects, you might never have been caught.”

There was that dreadfully patronizing smile again. “But, Mrs. Harper, I haven’t been caught. You are telling me a fine story, and when you’re done, you yourself will take some of my opium tincture and fall fast asleep. You need have no fear of pain, just as my other patients felt none. I only regret that I will have no access to your fortune, although I suspect that, as an undertaker, you don’t have one worth considering. I use Sydenham’s formula for my opium tincture. It takes two weeks to macerate the opium, saffron, cinnamon, cloves, and sherry, but it creates a very palatable formula for administering it in large doses. You will enjoy the taste.”

Ah, that explained Mr. Wesley having the odor of cloves on his breath.

“And, yes, you were correct in your earlier assertion. I attempted to have Crugg use prefilled syringes to ensure the right amount, but he was squeamish about injecting a living body, so I had to rely on him to dropper the right dose into their mouths. He was quite hopeless at it.”

Violet started to understand why Crugg was so keyed up all the time. She would be, too, if she were involved in such improprieties.

“Mr. Yates must have awoken during the train’s journey,” she continued. “Probably a combination of the noise and motion of the train, and an inadequate dose of laudanum, made him confused, so he rang the coffin bell.”

“Stupid Yates. I told him the bell was only for me to ring when everything was clear, not if he merely woke up on the platform before I had secured him. Of course, it would have to be
you
waiting on the platform with me, wouldn’t it? Ultimately, though, you proved a minor inconvenience once I realized you hadn’t heard what the man said.”

Violet was puzzled. “What he said? I only recall that Mr. Yates was muttering something nonsensical.”

“No, he was confused in his drugged state, and was saying that he had to find a bank. I ushered him away on the pretense of checking him over, to get him out of your presence as quickly as possible.”

Violet still didn’t understand. “Why did he want a bank?”

“He must have thought he was still in London. All of my customers were required to sign over their monetary assets into an alias of mine. Once they arrived in Surrey, I would sign everything back over into whatever new name they had adopted for themselves, less my considerable handling fee, naturally.”

“Naturally.” Violet was amazed by the man’s arrogance.

“But I am not a stupid man, Mrs. Harper. It came to my attention that I could demand much more than twenty percent of their money, and that they would be in no position to refuse me. If they did, well . . .” Ambrose spread his hands apart. “Yates was smart enough not to refuse me, but Mr. Wesley wasn’t quite as intelligent.

“First, he jumped out like a madman when you rang the bell on his coffin. I suppose he couldn’t be blamed for assuming that was my signal, but it was most inconvenient. Then he threatened to sue me for increasing my price.” Ambrose shook his head. “Foolish.”

Violet realized something else. “Your arrangement with Royal Surrey County Hospital enables you to easily dispose of the bodies of those who don’t pay you what you want, meaning you get paid by your victims, then again by the hospital.”

“As I said, Mrs. Harper, I am a very successful physician.”

“Physician” was hardly what Byron Ambrose could be called.

“Once you realized I was poking about at the hospital—presumably because Nathan Blackwell mentioned it to you—you immediately went there to mar Wesley’s body so that I wouldn’t figure out how he had died.”

“Blackwell is a ninny, hardly worthy of his position, although he does stay out of my way.”

“He isn’t that much of a ninny, sir, for he implicated you. Not by name, of course, but by giving me a description I was sure to recognize.”

Ambrose harrumphed in derision. “Then he isn’t a ninny, he’s a nitwit. Not that it matters much.”

Blackwell’s personality defects were irrelevant in Violet’s mind. “He tried to tell me that Wesley died from swallowing acid.”

At this, Ambrose laughed. “He probably thought you were accusing him of a crime against Wesley, and he didn’t have the courage to stand up against the little lady undertaker and tell you to mind your own business.”

Violet wanted to know more about Wesley. “I admit I was confused. There were no apparent marks on him, and he was fully clothed, which made no sense if he was an indigent body taken there for dissection.”

“I asked Mr. Wesley to join me for a friendly drink to celebrate his departure after he had refused my request for more money. It was no hardship for him to take the opium-laced drink. In fact, we could almost say he did it to himself, so readily did he accept the glass.”

Poor Mr. Wesley, he had had no idea that his plan to start a new life had ensured his death.

“Mr. Wesley was from Piccadilly but wore cheaply made clothes, and I—”

“Yes, I always tell the fools to dress in middle-class clothing for their coffin journeys, just so they do not draw attention to themselves in case things go awry, as you can see they sometimes do. Most listen to me, but some dolts cannot resist their silks and brocades. At least Wesley was obedient in that respect.”

“What of Jeremiah Dormer? Was he a successful escapee, or will I find him in the hospital’s burial ground?”

Ambrose’s smile was both enigmatic and chilling to behold. “I don’t think he’s anyone you need to worry your little head over. I am quite good at taking care of those who don’t listen to me.”