The Vice Society (13 page)

‘Does that seem likely? He was with another man.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘But . . . O, I see. Do we have anything new on who the other man might have been?’

‘Perhaps from Mr Sampson’s club. The brother said he had never met any of Jonathan’s friends. It was almost, he said, as if his brother wanted to keep his family and friends separate. Understandable enough for a single man with that style of life, one might say.’

‘I suspect you are correct. Have you been to the deceased’s home at Hoxton?’

‘Indeed. The brother took me there. It was all quite normal for a single man living alone. No evidence to help our case, except perhaps a rather impressive library.’

‘What manner of books? One might know much about a man from his reading.’

‘That is what interests me, sir. I have brought a few examples. The titles are on the spines. I have the other books under lock and key.’

‘Ah, I was wondering at those volumes you brought in with you. Let me see. Pass them over.’

‘I should warn you, sir—’

‘Give them here. I do not recognize the titles:
The Cult of Ganymede
;
Eispenelas and Aitas
;
The Corinthian Rites
;
The Art of Astyanassa
. . . a historical interest, then.’

Sir Richard opened the slimmest of the volumes,
The Art of Astyanassa
, and was met immediately with an image demonstrating the adaptability and flexibility of a lady so inclined to please a number of gentlemen at one moment. The police commissioner flushed, cleared his throat, and rapidly turned the page to see two ladies and two gentlemen engaged in a tangle of limbs that would have been improper even if they had not all been quite naked. His jaw clenched, and, with his eyes refusing to meet those of Inspector Newsome, he closed the covers and picked up
The Corinthian Rites
, opening it at random to read a line. Whatever was written there blanched his blush into pallor.

‘There were dozens of these books, sir. Many of them illustrated so – some of them in French, Latin or Greek. They are not cheap – perhaps ten shillings for the larger leather-bound ones. I note that the publisher and vendor of most of them is one Henry Poppleton of Holywell-street. I also found a recent bill from that publisher concerning a delivery of books.’

‘Yes, yes. I know of the man; he has spent a few periods in gaol for his outrages upon public morality. Tell me, Inspector – have any of our men seen these books?’

‘Only I and Constable Cullen, sir.’

‘Good. I do not want this . . . this unspeakable filth polluting the Metropolitan Police as it has infected certain minds in our society. I trust that you will keep the books locked away until the moment we can dispense with them. Then they should be burned.’

‘Yes, sir. I have made plans to visit the publisher as soon as possible to question him about Jonathan Sampson and anything else he might know.’

‘Good. Good. So – is there anything further?’

‘One thing only. I went to the deceased’s place of work to speak with his fellows there. They all described him as something of a solitary figure: an intelligent man, a diligent worker, a civil enough sort, but not one to mix freely with work colleagues. Everything as one would expect bearing in mind what we know.’

‘Indeed. And his club?’

‘That is proving more difficult. Naturally, I would like to gain access to the club to speak with those who spent time with Mr Sampson in his “secret” life, but obstacles are being put in my way: such-and-such a time is inconvenient; the secretary is unavailable on this day; visiters are not allowed on such a day . . . I wonder if your sources at the Vice Society might help me gain access.’

‘Which club is it?’

‘The Continental.’

‘I know of it. It has something of a reputation. Perhaps I can contact some of its more respectable members. I will see what I can do.’

Inspector Newsome collected the indecent books from Sir Richard’s desk and put them under his arm in preparation to leave. ‘Well – if that will be all . . .’

‘Wait, Inspector. You told me two days ago that you thought this was an accident. Do you still believe so?’

‘Sir – if this is not a murder, I will retire.’

As those two senior figures spoke, perhaps the reader has been wondering about the whereabouts of Constable Cullen, who was not of a sufficient rank to appear alongside Inspector Newsome in Sir Richard’s office. He did not have his own desk at Scotland Yard and instead was waiting in an anteroom for his superior to return for further investigation.

Life as a detective was not as he had imagined. It involved long hours and a lot of brainwork of the sort that Sergeant Williamson had made look so simple when they had worked together just a few months previously. When that great investigator had left the Force, there had been much rumour and gossip among the men about the reasons for it, and many had come to John Cullen for his opinion. In truth, he could offer nothing but the physical abuse his erstwhile superior had sustained on the case. That, and the small matter of aiding a prisoner’s escape from gaol.

Mr Williamson would have had the better of this Holywell-street case by now, mused Constable Cullen, who found it a fabric of lies and mysteries that simply could not be teased apart. How to prove that Mrs Colliver was lying? How to interpret the bleary-eyed and drunken testimony of Mr Jessop? There must be
something
– a clue – that was staring them in the face. If only he, John Cullen, could discern what that was, he might be accepted into the Force permanently and, one day, himself become a great detective.

Needless to say, that was never going to happen. Had he been able to look just a few days into the future, he would have seen something far more interesting – and he would have realized that he would be working once more with Mr Williamson sooner than he could have expected.

NINE

Mr Williamson was most uncomfortable. As he walked stiffly arm in arm with Charlotte up Windmill-street, he felt that everyone was watching and judging him. Surely everyone could see that the girl was a magdalene and that he was her client?

In his mind, he stopped her a dozen times and told her that this was a ridiculous idea – that she was clearly lying, that she should leave him and return home rather than walk the streets. But if there was the slightest chance that she did indeed know a woman called Persephone, this might be his best opportunity thus far of moving closer to a solution.

He walked rigidly upright, as if the gentle pressure of her arm in his were a mortal threat to be resisted at all costs. He tried not to look at her.

‘If you talk to me, people will think we are friends rather than lovers,’ said Charlotte, discerning his discomfort.

‘We are
not
lovers!’ said Mr Williamson, rather too loudly.

‘Still, you might at least speak to me as we walk. What is your name?’

‘A fine time to ask. But I would prefer not to tell you.’

‘Then make one up. “Charlotte” isn’t mine.’

He looked sidelong at her and beheld again her youthful beauty. She smiled as if she had known him for the whole of her short life. How could she smile so and yet be mired in depravity, selling her body to sin every night? How could she be so pure of complexion and yet be rotten to the core?

‘Why do you call yourself Charlotte?’

‘It’s a pretty name, isn’t it? Prettier than my real one anyway. Aren’t I pretty?’

‘I . . . well . . . I suppose so.’

‘My, you’re a flatterer!’

Mr Williamson blushed deeply and returned to his stiff demeanour. ‘Are we almost at our destination?’

They were walking west along Brewer-street, and Charlotte steered them right into Golden-square, whereupon she approached a grandiose-looking house and produced a key. The door banged shut behind them and Mr Williamson had entered that pulchritude-baited trap . . .

We will see presently what he experienced there, but perhaps it would first be beneficial for us to take a brief digression (or transgression) into Charlotte’s world that we might understand it better.

I have had much cause (for one reason or another) to investigate
Venus vulgaris
, and she is a curious species. Oftentimes, she begins her career at a tender age: sold into her trade by poor parents, or tricked into it by a procuress and trained in the arts of pleasure, or attracted to it by the sums to be made with a pretty face. Charlotte was of the latter variety: a milliner’s girl who found she could make much more money by ‘being kind to gentlemen’.

Stroll across London from West to East and you will see their varying habitats. At St James-square, the prettiest girls vie for the attentions of gentlemen who, for a short time, might maintain them in rooms of their own – at least until a younger and more attractive girl catches the eye. At Regents-street, the girls are still among the finest of their type, and if they occasionally stroll out, it is to visit the supper rooms before they retire home with a new friend (though it is easier in winter to rely upon the services of an introduction house, where she can meet a suitable fellow chosen for her, for a small consideration, by the discerning mistress). Even at Soho and Leicester-square might one find a pretty specimen, though her dress does not have quite the style or newness of her westerly neighbours, nor her face the same light of youth.

Head further east from here, however, and one enters the realm of the true street girl. Yes, she has a certain charm, but it is of a vulgar and degraded sort. These are the girls we see entering the coffee houses late at night and flirting shamelessly with the customers, or loitering about the shopping streets to snare a gent wearing fine gloves. Or she might hang out of a lower-floor window on Waterloo-road to attract her prey with an indecent show of bosom and a saucy invitation. Or perhaps she occupies a brothel, from which she rarely ventures into the light of day. These women are no victims; it is the men who are
their
victims.

Alas, beauty fades and tastes remain with the fresh and the young. The bright young thing of St James’s or Mayfair is, twenty years hence, the carrion crow of Ratcliff-highway, St Giles’s and the docks: so lined and withered that only sailors and soldiers will pay. What they once did for a sovereign then, later, for a pound, they will finally do for three shillings. And if not for money, for a handkerchief or a glass of gin. One must survive one way or another, and the sisterhood of Venus always survives.

Charlotte, it need hardly be said, was of the finer sort. Her rooms were paid for by a gentleman who was not her father (though assumed to be such by her neighbours) and she had the wit to be firmly established in the west. Like the most successful of her kind, she was a shrewd enough judge of character, having learned some time past that it is the older man, the married man, who is the reliable and grateful customer. Perhaps that is what she saw in Mr Williamson as she walked down Haymarket that evening – for, assuredly, she chose her clients more than they chose her.

‘May I make you a cup of tea? A glass of sherry to warm you up? It’s bitter these days, isn’t it?’ she said as she took off her shawl and bent to start a fire in the grate.

He looked around at her lodgings, brightly lit now in the gaslight. The
décor
was not lavish, but it suggested the kind of income that he could not himself boast of: good furniture, a new rug, clean curtains of damask and a number of paintings. Above all, the room had a lady’s touch that he had not experienced for some years – an atmosphere that seemed warm and light in contrast to the bleakness of his own home.

‘No thank you,’ he answered. ‘Is this the home of the woman we talked about?’

‘It is. She lends me her key for when I have visiters. I expect her home shortly.’

‘You told me on Haymarket that she will not admit just anyone, and yet I am admitted already.’

‘My, what a memory you have! She lives in the flat upstairs – we will hear when she arrives. Tell me: what profession are you in? My first guess was policeman from the way you looked around the street, but there is something else in your manner that I cannot place. And are you going to take off your hat and coat and take a seat, or will you stand there like that until the lady arrives?’

‘I would prefer to stand.’

‘As you wish. I am going to sit here by the fire and warm my legs.’ And at this Charlotte sat and raised her skirt fractionally so that her ankles were exposed. If she had done it for Mr Williamson’s benefit, she did not show it.

‘Hmm. What time does the lady typically arrive home?’

‘Perhaps nine o’clock.’

‘Is she in the same line . . . in the same . . . What is her profession?’

‘You may speak to her and ask her all you like, sir. But in the meantime perhaps you will speak to me. You have a kind face. Won’t you tell me what you do?’

‘I work for a charity.’

‘O Lord! Don’t talk to me of charities, sir!’

‘Why not? They do much fine work about the city.’

‘I’m sure they do, but they are forever meddling in my business: those from the Magdalene Hospital at St George’s-fields, or the Guardian Society at Bethnal Green or the Society for the Protection of Young Females. So many invitations I have to save myself! And spend the rest of my days in Chapel or in service? That is not the life for me, sir.’