Suzanne Robinson (37 page)

“You only come back to make trouble for the rest of us. So I don’t see no reason to make merry. Last time you showed your pretty face. Chokey got his throat slit for you.”

“Chokey went with me for his own interest.”

“He went with you for the same reason poor old Badger here does, and Prigg, and the rest of your followers. You twist them and beguile them until they don’t know day from night, and then you use them. You’re the worst of the leaders, Nightshade. You use us like you use your boots.”

Nightshade sat up so swiftly that Maudie would have backed away if she hadn’t been against the door already. He swung his long legs off the bed, rose and drew near her. Fixed on his mobile, dark lips was a smile of little-boy sweetness. He stopped in front of Maudie and cocked his head to the side.

“Usefulness is a virtue.” He bent and whispered, “And since you profit the most from this
virtue, you’ll keep you complaints to yourself or I’ll give you better reasons to reproach me.”

Maudie’s palms began to sweat, and she nodded. But Nightshade had already turned, with that swiftness of movement that recalled the acrobatics of a hawk in flight. He walked to the center of the room, raised his arms and uttered a chimelike laugh.

“Good news,” Nightshade said. “There’s blunt to be made. Easy, quick and lots of it.”

Badger knocked his knees together in his eagerness to join Nightshade. “How much, governor? More than a quid?”

Nightshade ruffled Badger’s ginger hair. “Much much more.”

Prigg joined them at this news.

“How much?” he asked with breathless anticipation.

“Ah,” breathed Nightshade. “That’s my greedy fellow. You’d sell you infant sister to a brothel for a quid, wouldn’t you, Prigg?”

Prigg scowled at him. “You’re a born devil, Nightshade. How much?”

“If you’re quick and silent, ten pounds each.”

“Ten!” Badger began to dance from one foot to the other.

Maudie interrupted. “What’s the line of work? It can’t be a crack, or we’d get a share of the loot. And it’s got to be dangerous, for the price speaks of peril.”

“You’re good at selling watered ale, Maudie,
but never think you’re flash at the better sort of crime.” Nightshade resumed his pose on the bed and surveyed the group with malicious benevolence. “An easy style of work, my imps. All we’ got to do is find a lady what’s got lost in the rookeries.”

His listeners exchanged glances. Then Badger spoke.

“Some toff’s lady’s got herself lost in St. Giles or Whitechapel, and we’re to find her?”

“You’re looking sharp,” Nightshade replied as he fluffed his pillows.

Maudie shrugged. “If she’s been gone for more than a day, she’s either dead or in some brothel.”

In one smooth movement Nightshade twisted around to face her with a nasty grin. “Not this one.”

“Why not this one?” Maudie demanded.

“Because, my fine mistress of spirits and drunkards, she’s a spinster, an old maid, plain, fussy, timid and dowdy. Depend upon it. She’s hiding in some dark, quiet hole of a place, quivering and whimpering.”

Prigg snapped his fingers. “Wait. I heard tell that Mortimer Fleet and his dogs is looking for some woman. This her?”

“I doubt it,” Nightshade said. “What would Fleet want with an old spinster lady? He’s probably looking for one of his harlots what’s took her wages without giving him his toll.”

Prigg exchanged uneasy glances with Big Maudie, who turned a suspicious gaze on their leader. “You certain about this?”

Nightshade tossed his hair back from his face and laughed a soft laugh with all the sympathy of a viper. “It will be easy profit, my hounds. How difficult can it be to hunt down an old maid?”

Eight nights later, the old maid scurried from a butcher’s shop in Whitechapel. She was carrying a basket laden with food, tightly packed with its lid tied down. Before leaving the road she gave it an exacting survey. Then she slipped into the blackness of Knife Lane, hurried past rows of neglected, once-elegant houses, and turned into an alley between the lane and a mews. There she set down the basket, stooped and searched through yards of skirt for her back hem.

Had she not been wearing a threadbare, hooded cloak and been in need of secrecy, Primrose Victoria Dane would have attracted attention from the street vendors, harlots, dock laborers and char women of east London. Few char women appeared distracted or had a distant gaze that seemed fixed on a dream just out of everyone else’s sight; fewer still wore fashionable silk dresses.

Beyond her dress, Primrose would have caught the notice of anyone who appreciated hair with as many shades of blond as a bird has
feathers and merry eyes whose gray-green depths were ringed with teal. Her refined appearance gave the impression of meekness not often met in Whitechapel. This impression was supported by the delicacy of her carriage, the fluidity of her walk, and the air of apologetic hesitation Prim often wore in company. Certainly none of her acquaintances or the inhabitants of east London would expect Miss Primrose Victoria Dane’s soft hands with slim fingers that ended in pink, rounded tips to be employed in the tasks they’d undertaken lately in order to survive.

Those pink fingertips finally found the hem of her gown and pulled it up between her legs. Prim stuffed it into her front waistband. Now she could move and climb without tripping over her skirt. Picking up her basket, she hooked it on one arm and got into a wagon with a broken spoke that had been left in the alley beside the mews. Balancing on the seat, she gripped a window ledge and began to climb.

Prim wasn’t nearly so frightened as she had been two weeks ago when she’d first run away. Not that she’d meant to run away, but that’s what one did when one witnessed a murder and a killer chased one into the rookeries of St. Giles. She had been on her way to teach her poor children their weekly lesson, and she’d been late because Lady Freshwell had once again objected to her “going about in the company

of rude persons,” meaning little Alice Kettle, who had come all the way across London by herself for the honor of accompanying Prim. Lady Dorothy Freshwell, whom Prim had secretly christened “the hedgehog” for her unfortunate resemblance to that snout-nosed and prickly creature, was her aunt.

Prim had finally escaped the hedgehog, but the delay had brought her and Alice into St. Giles at dusk. Alice knew a shortcut to the house where the informal school was held. They were hurrying through the darkening streets and turned down a narrow passageway beside a tavern. Prim didn’t know what made her stop and clutch Alice, or what caused her to shrink against a wall and seek shelter behind a stack of crates. Perhaps it was the rough viciousness in the voice of one of the men in the passage. Perhaps she’d glimpsed the face of the woman as she saw the knife raised over her head. It might have been the way the second man grabbed the woman so that she couldn’t escape.

Prim paused in her climbing. She squeezed her eyes shut and fought the return of images of the knife and the woman. What came to her instead was the vision of the second man, a man she never expected to see in St. Giles. She knew his name. He had attended her aunt’s ball only last month. He should have been in some silk-draped drawing room or on a bench in Parliament. Prim bit her lower lip and made herself
forget the man’s face for the moment. Her object was to get back to the Kettles’ bare apartment alive and unnoticed.

She gripped the top of the wall and climbed up to balance on the gutter of the mews. Alice Kettle’s young brothers, the twins Hal and Hugh, had taught her the art of roof traveling. Prim inched her way across the mews. Reaching the next building, she stepped up to a window, climbed to the higher roof, and crossed its flat expanse. Prim almost smiled as she wondered what Lady Dorothy Freshwell would say of this activity, if indeed she could even recognize her charge. No doubt she would turn prickly and lament the demise of the real Primrose, that retiring, bookish dreamer who gave no trouble and seldom put herself forward. Her dire situation had occasioned the change. She had managed to adapt in order to survive, but Prim was certain Lady Freshwell would rather see her dead than climbing roofs and living with the Kettles.

She continued her progress for some minutes without having to descend, but eventually was forced to use a crooked passage that would take her past a street full of taverns, a music hall and a brothel—the existence of which she had recently learned from the twins. She hurried to cross an intersection with an alley off the main road, for it contained a gas light. As she stepped into the open, a man smoking a pipe and wearing
an ugly yellow and red checked waistcoat passed the gas light.

Prim suppressed a gasp and shrank back into the shadows of the passageway. The man paused in the yellow light to tamp down some tobacco in the bowl of his pipe and light it. His face was grimy, as if he worked in a coal mine, and his hair, which might have been blond, was greasy and clung to his head and ears. When he drew on his pipe Prim could see that his front teeth were brown near the gums. She knew this man.

Jowett was one of the ruffians sent to hunt her down. The two murderers had seen her in that alley. They’d chased her, lost her, and now they had sent their hirelings to find her. Prim couldn’t go home. She’d never reach the west end of London alive. It was difficult enough to fetch food for the Kettles, who had taken her in and hid her, but she was determined to succeed. Betty Kettle had just given birth to her ninth child. The poor woman was exhausted and undernourished. She needed the mutton and fresh milk Prim had purchased; she wasn’t likely to get help from her husband, who drank most of his wages.

Prim waited until Jowett continued on his way before she crossed the intersection. Then she took to the roofs again. Jowett had a partner named Stark. Prim had been chased by them several times. They always moved together, so she would have to keep alert for the pair. She
hurried across another flat roof and was about to leap down to a lower one when Jowett appeared. She crouched and watched him skulk down the road to stand almost directly below her. He stood there and turned his narrow, dirty head in a half circle, like some questing vulture. Then he leaned against the wall and dug out a tobacco pouch.

Prim waited a while, but Jowett had taken root. The longer she remained outside, the greater the chance she would be found. Prim set her basket down and glanced over the roof. It was littered with old newspapers, broken glass and straw. Here and there lay old bricks and chunks of mortar. Prim picked up a brick. It’s surface was rough against her hand. She hefted it, but glanced up when she caught movement out of the corner of her eye. Seeing nothing, she chided herself for being so excitable and looked over the roof at the top of Jowett’s head.

Still hefting the brick, she noted that the man wore a soft cap, but it was made of thin material. Prim stood with her feet planted apart and raised the brick in both hands over her head. She had always been good at playing catch and throwing a ball with her older brother. Pray God she still had the skill. Prim kept her eyes on her target, gripped the brick tightly and hurled it down. The missile hit Jowett square on his greasy skull. He dropped to his knees and to the
ground without uttering a word, his pipe and pouch still in his hands.

Prim rose and dusted her hands. Taking up her basket, she put her foot on the edge of the roof, preparing the spring across to the next building. She bent her knees and leaped, but something snaked around her waist and pulled her back. Someone had grabbed her! She sailed through the air and was set on her feet, but in her panic she lost her footing. The basket flew out of her grip and her skirt came loose from her waistband. She landed beside the basket on her bottom, her skirts above her knees, the hood of her cloak askew. Ignoring the pain in her bottom, Prim wrestled out of the tangle of her cloak and skirts and grabbed a nearby brick. Scrambling to her feet she backed away from the dark figure looming over her.

“Come nearer and I’ll bash you!”

If she had ever imagined the laughter of a demon, it would have been the sound that came tumbling at her. All mockery, chapel chimes and evil, just like what would issue from a fallen and corrupt angel. Fear wrapped a sheet of ice around her body. The man who had grabbed her sauntered closer, close enough for her to see him in the light of the moon. Silver illuminated his face. Slim, mobile lips curled into a smile that almost gave her relief from her fear. But she looked into his eyes—and was almost dragged into the depths of a black sea of menace.
It was then that Prim knew she was going to die.

The man put his hand beneath his coat and withdrew something. Prim nearly dropped her brick in her fear that he had a knife, but he wasn’t even looking at her. He was looking at a picture. His gaze lifted to her face, and his brow furrowed. Then his expression changed again; the mockery and ruthlessness returned. She heard a soft murmur that should have allayed her terror but fed it instead.

“Choke me dead. It’s the old maid at last.”