The Devil's Making (30 page)

‘I asked her if she'd come to my room. But she said she was still bleedin' from the surgery, and she couldn't.'

‘Was she upset?'

‘Not that I could see. She was a great one for weepin' and wailin', but last night she was cold as ice.'

‘And what did you say?'

‘Whaddya mean? Look, Hobbes, I'm a man, you understand? I told you that before. I got needs. I ain't remarried. So what am I supposed to do? Am I a saint? That's what I said to Kathleen last night. “Am I a saint?”'

‘And she said, “Yes, of course you are…” I couldn't help myself.

‘Awright, awright. She said, “You ain't no saint, you're a devil.” But she didn't mean it. She weren't cryin' or nothin'.'

‘Where were you on Wednesday afternoon of last week'

‘You mean when the doctor was killed? You don't think I'd do that? Hey, come on, Hobbes.' Quattrini, still standing, loomed over me.

I got up, taller than he. ‘In this context you should call me Sergeant', I said. ‘Please answer my question.'

‘That's the damned thing,' Quattrini said, licking his lips. ‘Usually I'd be here at the warehouse, but I wasn't. I was at home, with her – with Kathleen. I'd gone home for lunch, which I sometimes do. She was feelin' poorly, on account of her bein' on the rag after the surgery. She wasn't up to doin' housework. So I gave Ellen the day off and I stayed at home with Kathleen.'

‘Doing what?' I was not inclined to accept that Quattrini had been acting out of loving-kindness.

‘Hell, you don't need to know that.'

‘Doing what?'

‘I got her to give me a back rub, that sort of thing – hell, there's lots of things a woman can do for a man. You know that, Hobbes – I mean Sergeant.'

‘So you still used the girl.'

‘She didn't mind. Usually, like I say, she could be as cold as ice. I mean, she never really enjoyed it', if you know what I mean. But that afternoon she was feelin' low. She even said she wanted me to hold onto her and take care of her. Then over the followin' days she became cold again, sort of floatin' around, pale, like an angel, not talkin' to no one.'

‘And now she's dead and she can't say you were really with her that afternoon.'

‘Sergeant.' Quattrini seemed chastened. ‘You can't pin that killin' on me. Why would I do that?'

‘Perhaps he was blackmailing you. You're a rich man.'

‘If I stay in Victoria much longer I won't stay rich … But McCrory, a blackmailer? Never. Like I told you once before, there was sumpn' funny about him. I figure he got close to women, not by cuddlin' with 'em, but by helpin' em out. Almost as if he
was
a woman. Hell, I never minded him doin' the surgery on Kathleen.'

‘You might have been jealous?'

‘With another man, sure. Getting' into her private parts? When I have a woman she's
mine.
' Quattrini had rebounded into his usual confidence. ‘But a blackmailer? No. McCrory believed in whatever he did – all those weird ideas – he was almost religious about 'em. Made me think of some priests I've known.'

‘Don't you see you contributed to this girl's ruin?' I said, lapsing into priggishness. I tried to correct this by being more worldly. ‘Why take advantage of your servant? Why not get your needs met elsewhere? Say, in a dance hall.'

‘And throw away good money on whores?
Putane?
What do you take me for?'

‘So you had no quarrel with McCrory.'

‘Nope. The girl went over there one day. I sent the 100 dols with her. He kept her overnight and sent her back in a buggy. No receipt, but I didn't expect that. I saw him the Sunday after, out at the Farm. We had a private word together. He said Kathleen should come and see him once a week for a while. I should give her time off on Friday mornings, and send her to him with an envelope with ten dols, and he would give her a treatment. He said she needed it for her nerves, after the operation. Now you might think it was a kinda blackmail – to get ten dols a week outa me. And I did get annoyed, like it was an extra fee I hadn't bargained for. But he said it was for her own good. And you know what? I believed him.'

‘I suppose that will be all', I said. ‘As you see, I haven't taken this down. I may want to ask you more questions though. Oh yes. If you have any influence with that priest of yours, Father McMahon, see if you can get him to turn a blind eye to how that girl died, and bury her in consecrated ground. He thinks God doesn't turn a blind eye on anything. But you know, Mr Quattrini, that the girl would never have killed herself, had her life not been made intolerable.'

‘Don't you play God!' Quattrini flared for a moment. ‘But I'll talk to the Father. He's a hard man. Sergeant!' Quattrini took my arm and looked wildly into my eyes. ‘Never a word of this to Bella Somerville! That woman's pure as the driven snow. If she heard one word that I was sleepin' with Kathleen, I'd be finished! Then I might as well walk off the quay into the harbour myself!'

‘Of course I won't mention it to her.' I was becoming a keeper of secrets.

*   *   *

Quattrini believed McCrory – the Southern gentleman. Similarly he trusts me, and reveals himself to me – the English gentleman. McCrory and I apparently have it in common that we appear gentlemen. Quattrini referred to McCrory as a ‘devil'. Then there is the ‘King George devil.' All Englishmen are ‘King George'. Witherspoon. King George
par excellence
– George Beaumont. Another gentleman. There is something devilish about Beaumont – his rictus smile, his woodenness. But that is a caricature. What is wooden about the devil? The devil is surely like a snake. He creeps along, he is subtle, deceptive, two faced. If I were the devil how would I want to appear in Victoria? What would be my outer face? Perhaps a wooden soldier like Beaumont. Or a whited sepulchre like Firbanks. My father used to joke that the Devil if he wanted to incarnate himself as a person would surely choose to do so as a clergyman. ‘I mean, why the devil would the devil want to appear as he is – evil and twisted?,' he said. ‘He would appear as some smooth and jovial country vicar – like me! It was generous of him, or perhaps cautious, not to say ‘like some smooth country curate', meaning Aubrey. But he had a point. Everyone here is afraid of the Indians. They are devils. Freezy obliges, he lives up to the fears, by chopping his wife's head off on the beach facing town. Wiladzap, Lukswaas, the whole lot of them out at Cormorant Point, are devils. Of course Wiladzap butchered McCrory. That's what devils do. To hell (as it were) with
mens rea
, Wiladzap doesn't need a
reason
to kill. He just kills, that's all.

But that is not enough for me. McCrory's death may be, as Parry said, the devil's making. If so I should seek the devil in the smooth faces of my friend Frederick, of Firbanks, of George Beaumont. Quattrini? No devil he. Just a bad man. And why a man? Could a woman have killed McRory? Should I seek the smooth faced devil in Lukswaas? In one of the Somerville ‘eligibles'?

This is ridiculous. If I were not myself, Chad Hobbes, I would start suspecting Chad Hobbes, the smooth faced, upright, priggish young detective constable – sorry, Acting Sergeant – another devil.

*   *   *

I reached the ironmongers just as it was closing. Frederick was showing the last customers to the door, and the other clerk was nowhere visible.

‘Chad, old chap. On the prowl?'

‘Yes. I'd like to have a word with you.'

‘Of course. Just let me lock up.'

Frederick locked the door and swung the sign behind it around so that from the inside it read ‘OPEN'. Since the sun, low in the sky, shone from behind the building, it was gloomy in the store, although the street outside was in a glare. Frederick pulled out two tall stools and set them beside the counter. We sat facing each other as if at a bar.

Looking carefully at Frederick's face, I brought out the envelope and opened it, setting the locket on the counter between us.

Frederick's eyes widened. ‘I say, that's my locket', he said. ‘Where did you find it?'

‘Where do you think?'

‘No idea. I lost it a few weeks ago. Thought it was stolen.'

‘You wear a locket, Frederick?'

‘Steady on. Of course not. I was merely going to send it home to my sister.'

‘Frederick, you know perfectly well where I got this. Don't lie to me.'

‘Lie to you?' Frederick's face had its usual expression of candour and innocent enthusiasm, but he had gone very pale.'

‘It was worn on a very cold bosom', I said.

‘What do you mean, old chap?'

‘I know Kathleen was a reticent sort of girl, but she did tell some things to the other maid, Ellen, with whom she shared a room – and a language, come to that.'

‘Damn it!', Frederick said rather feebly. ‘We did become rather fond of each other. That's when I gave her the locket. And then this morning I heard she had drowned herself. Poor Kathy!', he said in a hollow, mournful voice.

‘You're leaving out all the interesting bits,' I said cruelly, ‘such as her becoming “enceinte”'.

‘All right, Chad old boy. But I didn't know if it was by me or that old beast Quattrini. She said it was by me – she said she could feel it was. But that was only because she wished it, I suppose. Anyway, I said there was nothing I could do about it. We had a row, actually. But I wasn't about to acknowledge the paternity of a child that might not be mine. She was, of course, in a dreadful stew. Then she came and said Quattrini had arranged for some surgery to get rid of the child. Of course he didn't know I was in the picture. That was a relief. But it gave her the “blues”, as she put it – meaning she cried a lot, as she tended to do anyway. It was with McCrory, by the way, the surgery. You know that?'

‘Yes. Did you talk to him about it?'

‘Not beforehand. He had a word with me out at Orchard Farm the following Sunday. Quite decent about it, actually. He said he knew I had been Kathy's lover. She had told him. He said she would come to see him for a while, to deal with the after-effects of the operation. He said she would be prone to hysteria, after such an assault on the uterus – “hysteros”, as you know. It would seem he was right, too. And…'

‘What?'

‘“I'll see if I can mend a broken heart”, he said. Made me feel quite bad, actually. I forgot to mention … I broke with her before the operation. It was time. I couldn't go on with it. Anyway, McCrory knew this too, and he very kindly offered to give
me
what he called “lessons in contraceptics”. For a fee, of course. Who knows, I might have taken him up on it. Then he got killed.'

‘Where were you that afternoon?'

‘I was here. On the job. I didn't kill McCrory, if that's what you're insinuating.'

‘Did you know from the beginning of your relationship with the girl that she was Quattrini's mistress?'

‘No. Only that she was easier than she should have been.'

I felt disgusted but let it pass. ‘What did she tell you about Quattrini?'

‘That he was a beast. That he had forced her, originally. But of course maids get into these situations.'

‘Was she in love with you?'

‘I dare say she was. She said she'd never known anyone like me – gentle, and all that.'

‘Were you in love with her?'

‘Don't be silly, Chad. I said I was fond of her, that's all.'

‘Why did you meet in secret? Plenty of young men court their young ladies openly.'

‘A serving maid? I wasn't going to
court
her.'

‘But you're an ironmonger's clerk. As you would say yourself, “this isn't England”. The same distinctions just don't quite obtain here. The Americans in this town would see you on the same level as she. She would too, as a matter of fact – “gentle” or not. Did she not find you cruel?'

‘What's this got to do with police work, Chad? You're moralizing. You know perfectly well I would not take seriously a relation with a servant girl – any more than you would yourself if you stooped to it. But one has one's needs, doesn't one? Or don't you? You're such a prune.'

‘So you never considered marriage with her.' Here I knew vaguely that I was pursuing a line of questioning for my own good. It was indeed not police work.

‘Of course not. Not merely because she was an Irish kitchen-maid, but because she was, to put it bluntly, second hand goods. Would you marry a woman who gave herself easily to you? It's the worst thing they can do. She was spoiled already, by Quattrini.'

*   *   *

I paused in my questioning. My mind had wandered to Lukswaas. She had given herself to me – though perhaps under the pressure of my authority. She was spoiled – if that was what it was – by her relations with who knows how many men, not to speak of her husband Wiladzap whom she had apparently betrayed willingly. She was a ‘bad' woman. Yet what she and I had done together seemed so different from what other people did. I imagined Quattrini using the girl Kathy, herself seeing him as a ‘beast', and the gentle Frederick also using her, less beastly perhaps, but surely not with the sort of self-dissolving passion I felt for Lukswaas. It went further than the ‘need' which both Quattrini and Frederick talked about so glibly. Real desire was more than need … or was I deceiving myself?

*   *   *

‘When did you last see her?' I resumed wearily.

‘Last night. I do feel bad about that. About three in the morning it was. She threw gravel against my window. It's on the second floor – meaning, in English terms, the first. I opened the window and there she was in the street, like a wraith. She wanted to come in and see me. But I couldn't let her. It was all right for her to visit my rooms during the day, ostensibly for ‘tea'. But not at night. My landlady would have thrown me out. So I told Kathy to go home, in a sort of loud whisper. She stood looking at me. I closed the window. She must have gone away.'