The Curse Of The House Of Foskett (The Gower Street Detective Series) Page 17

‘How can I recognize him?’

  The younger nurse giggled. ‘You can’t miss him. He nearly fills the corridor and he’s got mutton chops like privet hedges.’

  ‘That’s no way to speak of a doctor,’ the older nurse scolded. ‘You won’t mention us, will you, miss?’

  ‘No. And thank you for what you are doing.’

  I stood a while after they had gone and tidied his hair, and bent over to kiss his brow, but before I could reach him one eye opened a crack.

  ‘Don’t fuss, Lucinda,’ he mumbled and the eye drifted shut again.

  They were covering the old man’s face as I left. I went to the chapel and sat at the back, and prayed for the man I never knew and the man I hoped to know again. A couple came in, smiling.

  ‘Thank God,’ the husband said. They put some money in the box and left, and I put my face into the cup of my fingers.

  ‘Give me something to thank you for,’ I whispered into my hands. People make deals when they want something from God. They promise to be good or give alms or go to church every day, but what could I bargain with that was worth Inspector Pound’s life?

  I opened a Bible and leafed through to the account of the centurion asking Jesus for help. Say but the word and my servant shall be healed. I used to find the words inspirational but now they seemed empty. I looked for something else, opening the book at random, but nothing brought me any comfort. Time passed and I went back up the stairs.

  The nurse had not exaggerated. Nobody could have missed Mr Sweeney as he progressed along the corridor. He was a man of truly enormous bulk, swaying side to side, his face almost hidden behind a shrubbery of whiskers, and followed by a gaggle of students and junior staff.

  ‘Might I have a word, Mr Sweeney?’

  He lumbered on. ‘I never discuss patients with relatives.’ His voice boomed like an operatic bass.

  ‘I know how busy you must be. My father was a surgeon.’

  He paused in his stride but did not stop rocking. ‘What was his name?’

  ‘Colonel Geoffrey Middleton.’

  ‘Never heard of him.’

  ‘He spent most of his time in private practice and the army. He was the first to describe Middleton’s Chorea.’

  ‘Was he, by Jupiter?’

  ‘I am Inspector Pound’s…’ my brain raced, ‘…fiancée.’ Friend sounded slightly indecent and he may have met the inspector’s sister already. ‘I wonder if you would consider giving him some more blood.’

  He guffawed and said over his shoulder. ‘And how do you suggest I do that – pour him a glass of it?’

  The acolytes tittered.

  ‘By transfusion,’ I said and the swaying stopped. ‘I assisted my father for many years so I know something about it.’

  ‘Then you will also know that three-quarters of patients being given blood go into acute circulatory shock and die during the procedure. Good day, Miss Middleton.’

  ‘I gave him blood at the London Hospital with no ill effect on either of us.’

  Mr Sweeney raised one eyebrow. ‘Did you, by Jove?’

  ‘Yes, and I was not aware that University College lags so far behind that it is unable to carry out the same procedure.’

  The students gasped in a way that would have done credit to the final act of a melodrama, if only they had remembered to throw up their hands. The great bulk of Mr Sweeney tilted alarmingly and examined me. ‘You are a highly presumptuous young lady.’

  ‘I am often told that,’ I informed him. ‘But perhaps in this case I was right to presume things. I presumed that you were one of the finest surgeons in London. You may not have heard of my father but he often spoke highly of your contributions to The Lancet. Perhaps it was his presumptions which were wrong.’

  I could almost swear two juniors threw up their hands, but I was too busy trying to fix his watery brown eyes to show him I was not afraid.

  ‘Do I look like a fish?’ He raised the other eyebrow.

  I wanted to say more like a whale but I settled for ‘Not very.’

  The students tried to stifle their amusement. He turned to them and they succeeded.

  ‘You think you can throw me the bait of vanity and reel me in?’

  I knew I was in danger of going too far. ‘I hoped to appeal to your professional pride.’

  He growled softly and said, ‘How much blood did you donate?’

  ‘Only about half a pint,’ I said. ‘So I have plenty to spare.’

  Mr Sweeney huffed. ‘I am much too busy for all of this nonsense,’ he told me as he started to lumber on. ‘Come back in an hour.’

  He was quick and efficient and I was quite relieved that he only took another pint. I would have given more but I was feeling quite woozy.

  ‘Keep the wound clean with carbolic acid,’ he told Matron as he slid the needles out.

  And as he was leaving he tilted towards me again. ‘There is no such thing as Middleton’s Chorea and I have never contributed to that vulgar publication The Lancet.’

  ‘I had to say something,’ I responded and he grunted.

  ‘Let us hope your prevarications have saved a life.’

  Inspector Pound shivered.

  Outside the rain had lifted and the sun was forcing its way feebly through that grey-beige that Londoners called a sky.

  33

  The Dead Either Side

  Elm Road was full of life. The baked potato man vied with the cries of the crumpet seller, a boy pulled a block of ice on a handcart and the milkman rolled a churn on its lower rim towards the steps of a cellar.

  We turned left down Plane Road and almost immediately the bustle ceased. There were no tradesmen here, only the pig man collecting swill from an imposing house on the corner. I patted his horse and it tried to push its nose into my handbag.

  The road had been dug up and some planks laid over two parallel trenches, but the earth was piled so high around the works that it was impossible to cross without our boots becoming caked and the hem of my dress being saturated with wet mud. The workmen were taking a break, leaning on their shovels in their thick coats, except for one in shirtsleeves.

  ‘He must be cold,’ I commented, but Sidney Grice was peering into the trench.

  ‘What with all these subterranean railways, passages, cellars, pipes and wires there will soon be more of London below the ground than above.’ Mr G scraped some of the sticky clay off his soles against the kerb.

  I walked on a few paces. ‘Here we are.’

  The church grew comfortably from its plot, grey stones, which might have been placed on top of each other three centuries or more ago, rising heavenwards as we walked down the path, the dead either side of us in a small ancient graveyard with the headstones laid flat upon the earth, most of them made illegible by frost and lichen, some half-buried under moss and grass.

  ‘Somebody wept each time these graves were filled,’ I said. ‘Now nobody even knows who they contain.’

  My guardian putted a twig to one side. ‘Very few people are worth remembering.’

  ‘They loved and were loved,’ I said.

  He paused to inspect a footprint on the verge. ‘There is nothing clever about that. A flea-bitten cur is capable – and probably more deserving – of affection than the average man.’

  We reached the porch and a great oak door strapped to the granite pillars by heavy black hinges studded with square pyramidal iron nails. ‘Locked.’ Sidney Grice turned the barley-twisted ring handle clockwise. ‘It is sobering to reflect that there have only been six periods in the island’s blood-soaked history when it has been felt necessary to keep our churches barred and we are living in one of them.’ He rapped three times smartly with the handle of his cane and we waited.

  ‘I wonder who will remember me,’ I said.

  ‘Nobody at all,’ my guardian said, ‘unless you put those journals of yours to some use and publish an account of your time with me.’

  I was about to tell him that I hoped to mean more than that to som
ebody some day when a small panel in the woodwork swung inwards and a man’s face appeared behind an inset fretwork box.

  ‘Mr Grice?’ The voice was high.

  ‘Reverend Jackaman?’

  ‘If you are Mr Grice, prove it by taking your eye out.’

  ‘Step off that kneeler first.’

  The face blinked. ‘How do you know I am standing on a kneeler?’

  ‘Because I am Sidney Grice.’

  The face pondered for a while. ‘Very well then. I am the Reverend Jackaman and now I should like you to leave.’

  ‘I am Miss Middleton,’ I told him and he looked shocked.

  ‘You may be hardly more than a child,’ the reverend said, ‘but you must know that a lady never introduces herself to a gentleman.’

  ‘If I should meet one I shall remember that,’ I told him, ‘but you ought to know that it is neither polite nor Christian to lock out a lady when she seeks access to the house of God.’

  ‘My apologies for that,’ he said. ‘Now kindly go away.’

  My guardian leaned towards the hole and it shut. ‘What are you frightened of, Reverend Jackaman?’ he called through the panel.

  ‘You,’ a muffled voice replied. ‘I read the papers. Every soul whom you have questioned regarding that accursed death club has met an horrible end.’

  ‘A horrible end,’ Sidney Grice corrected him and the panel swung open again.

  ‘Henry Alford would not have agreed with you.’

  ‘Henry Alford would never have agreed with anyone,’ my guardian retorted. ‘He was the epitome of charm, but one of the most disagreeable men I have ever met when discussing linguistic exactitudes.’

  ‘Who was Henry Alford?’ I asked.

  ‘Oh, what a meagre education the young receive and what a mean proportion of that they imbibe,’ the Reverend Jackaman bemoaned. ‘They are too busy dancing in the afternoons and listening to glee singers.’

  ‘And filling their heads with Byronian trash,’ my guardian concurred. ‘Henry Alford was, amongst other things, a Fellow of Trinity College, a scholar and a textual critic.’

  ‘And why are we talking about him?’

  ‘I suppose you would rather be discussing ribbons and buttons,’ Jackaman snapped. ‘I see these girls in my church, Mr Grice. They whisper and giggle during my sermons. They pass each other notes. All they have come for is to flaunt their flounces.’

  ‘It makes one despair for the empire,’ Sidney Grice tisked. ‘But we digress.’

  ‘Surely not,’ I murmured.

  ‘You can at least talk to me, Reverend.’

  ‘Can but will not,’ Jackaman rejoined. ‘Whilst others put their trust in Grice, I put mine in God. I seek his sanctuary in my own church.’ The panel closed.

  ‘You may be meeting your creator sooner than you think if you do not let us help you,’ Mr G called.

  ‘What’s all this then?’ We spun round to be confronted by a young man in a dazzling checked suit and bright yellow cravat, waving at us from the roadside. He came hurrying across, neatly leaping over an old man who was lying on the pavement. ‘Fretnin’ a man of the cloth, Mr Grice? Whatever next? Slaughterin’ babes in their mothers’ arms?’

  ‘The Lord is my Shepherd,’ the vicar was reciting loudly. ‘I shall not want…’

  ‘Blast,’ my guardian grumbled. ‘It is that blighter from the Evening Standard. Ignore him, March.’ But I could not take my eyes off him.

  The man sauntered up the path. He had a large white carnation in his buttonhole and wore white spats over black patent-leather shoes. ‘And who is this lovely lady? No, don’t tell me. I want to be able to write Sidney Grice Seen With Mysterious Dark Female Companion.’

  I laughed and said, ‘I am March Middleton, Mr Grice’s ward.’

  My guardian groaned and the young man tipped his natty bowler hat jauntily back with his silver-handled cane, to reveal dark Macassar-oiled hair.

  ‘Yea, though I walk through the shadow of the valley of death,’ came from inside the church.

  ‘Wotta disappointin’ly innocent explanation,’ the newcomer said. ‘Waterloo Trumpington at your service, miss.’ He took my hand and clicked his heels together like a Prussian officer at court.

  I laughed again. ‘Is that your real name?’ And Waterloo Trumpington grinned. He had nice white teeth and his face was smooth and boyish.

  ‘Is anyone’s?’

  ‘Mine is.’

  ‘Stop jabbering.’ Sidney Grice stood listening at the door. ‘And listen.’ But all I could hear was traffic from Elm Road and the voice of the vicar inside St Jerome’s.

  ‘Follow me all the days of my life.’

  Sidney Grice tensed. ‘Reverend Jackaman,’ he called out urgently. ‘Listen to me. Your life is in imminent danger.’ He rattled and wrenched at the handle. ‘For heaven’s sake, open up, man.’

  ‘And I shall dwell in the house of the Lord. What?… Who are you? How did you get in here?… What?… No!’

  The last word came as a prolonged piteous cry abruptly cut short. There was the sound of a scuffle and then silence.

  34

  Half-melted Candles and Angels to Smite

  Waterloo Trumpington’s visage changed in an instant. A moment ago he had been nothing more than a careless cockney dandy, but now the grin was replaced by a tight-lipped determination and the dancing eyes were fixed on the figure of my guardian.

  Sidney Grice had his ear to the door and signalled us to stay quiet. There was a bump and a low moan, and then a thump like somebody banging a table.

  ‘No,’ Reverend Jackaman cried out. ‘For the love of Christ our saviour.’

  I heard metal strike metal and a scream and then a series of six duller blows, steady and separate, each one accompanied by another shriek.

  Sidney Grice stood back and looked at the window.

  ‘Smash it,’ Waterloo Trumpington suggested. His voice was calm and strangely detached.

  ‘With what?’ my guardian demanded. ‘Anyway, it is too high and barred.’

  I banged on the woodwork with the side of my fist and yelled, ‘Open this door.’ But the only reply was a metallic clash and another cry.

  ‘Mighty Lord, send your angel to smite—’ But the words were lost in an agonized sob.

  The church was joined between two tall houses.

  ‘That’ – Sidney Grice pointed to the house on the left – ‘is the rectory. Go, Miss Middleton, and ask if there is a side entrance into the church. Hurry.’

  The hammering and shrieking began again, each cry more piteous than the last.

  There was a wall between the church grounds and rectory garden, with a gateway set into it. I ran across the graveyard, trying to avoid stepping on the tombstones, but the wooden gate was locked so I zigzagged back. Sidney Grice was rooting through his satchel while Waterloo Trumpington leaned languidly back on his stick, observing him. My guardian brought out a twisted piece of metal and rammed it into the keyhole.

  ‘Breakin’ into an ’ouse of God?’ Waterloo Trumpington mocked. ‘It gets better by the minute.’

  ‘Do something,’ I shouted.

  ‘I am.’ The reporter grinned. ‘I am doing my job and leaving your guardian to his.’

  ‘I have no time for this.’ I ran back down the path, calling over my shoulder. ‘The Evening Standard will be very interested in my account of how you stood back and let a man of God die.’

  I did not wait for a response but dashed down the footpath, cursing the impediment of my dress as I whipped though a low gate and to the front of the rectory. Panting heavily, I wrenched the bell. It tinkled merrily in the background and I wrenched it again. Ten times I rang, but there was no reply.

  I looked in through the window, cupping my eyes with my hands to the glass, but only saw a dull, unoccupied drawing room with an upright piano with half-melted candles in brass candelabras. I tried the bell again, yanking at the handle until I thought it would come off in my hand, and shouted out, ‘Hello. I
s anybody there?’ And then I heard it, clear and loud from the church of St Jerome.

  ‘Help… Somebody help me… No! Sacrilege. Please God, no!’ And that no became a wail soaring to the heavens, nothing but terror and pain and then nothing at all.

  I ran back. Sidney Grice was wrenching on his lever in the keyhole.

  ‘Now!’ he yelled and Waterloo Trumpington ran at an oak panel, flying into it with both boots and landing with great agility on his feet as the door crashed in. He checked his buttonhole and looked over my guardian’s shoulder, and the blood drained from his face. His fingers went to his cheek and he half-stepped, half-stumbled backwards.

  ‘Shit me,’ he said softly.

  ‘Stay out, March,’ Sidney Grice called, not taking his eyes off whatever confronted him. ‘And this time I mean it.’

  All the more reason to come in, I thought, but, for the first time since I had come to London and ever since that moment, I wished I had obeyed him.

  ‘Sacrilege,’ I whispered in an echo of something I had heard a long time ago when I had thought I knew what the word meant.

  35

  Blood and Water

  St Jerome’s looked normal for a moment – a small austere Norman structure with four rows of benches parted by a central apse and two side aisles, a tapestry-covered footstool lying on its side, and a marble altar with a silver candlestick on each corner, the body of the church being lit by a clumsy stained-glass window at each end. But Sidney Grice was not admiring the architecture. His attention was fixed on a heavy oak screen in front of the organ and what was attached to it.

  I gasped and steadied myself on the end of a pew. The thing I saw was a grotesquery, a travesty of a man and his redeemer. The Reverend Jackaman had been stripped to his blood-soaked calico drawers and skewered to the screen in a depraved mockery of the Crucifixion. A nail had been hammered through each of his wrists and a longer one through his overlapped feet. His head hung on to his chest, his scalp pierced by dozens of hat pins, some sticking out through the skin of his forehead, and a wooden spar jutted from where it had been thrust deep into his side and up under his ribcage.