The Yard (31 page)

“And I can imagine other uses for this,” Kingsley said. “I’ve been considering it for quite a while now. Think of how useful it might be in helping to find missing persons. Or identifying bodies. You have no idea how many bodies come through my laboratory in a week that are not claimed, that end up being buried anonymously.”

“I understand how frustrating that must be,” Sir Edward said. “I’m not entirely convinced, but there does seem to be enough merit here to explore this.”

“Thank you. Let me dust the opposite side as well, the side lying against the table now. There may be surprises awaiting us there. But at the moment, these finger marks do provide us some clues.”

“Such as?”

“You already knew that Mayhew, the dancing man, has handled the shears. But he did not handle the razor. That points to his innocence in the murders committed by … What did Mr Blacker call him?”

“The Beard Killer.”

“Right. The Beard Killer is not your dancing man. At least, I don’t believe he is. This doesn’t excuse him from possible suspicion in Inspector Little’s murder.”

“I have some trouble believing Mr Little would have been surprised and overpowered by the dancing man.”

“Nevertheless, it is at least a possibility. But the extraneous set of marks on the shears do not match any of the marks on the razor.”

“We already suspected that the Beard Killer and Little’s killer were not the same man.”

“But this confirms it.”

“If we can somehow find more prints to compare with both weapons…”

“The trunk. I will dust the entire trunk and we may discover something helpful there.”

“Indeed.”

“I wish we’d known of this even yesterday,” Sir Edward said. “I can see
how it may be quite useful in the future. But for now, please continue along traditional lines of investigation and use this as a last resort until we know more. I would like to have some confirmation that these finger patterns are always different. I won’t see a man convicted and imprisoned solely on the strength of his fingertip marks.”

“Of course, sir.”

“But let’s keep this in mind as a means of narrowing down the pool of suspects in a case.”

“Thank you, Sir Edward,” Kingsley said.

“Now—”

Kingsley and Day jumped at the sound of a knock at Sir Edward’s door.

“Yes?” Sir Edward said.

“Sir, there’s been a development,” Blacker said.

“Well, open the door and talk to me face-to-face, man.”

Blacker came in and bowed his head. “Sorry, sir.”

“Like the Crystal Palace in here today, all this traffic in and out of my office. What is it, man?”

“There’s been another murder.”

“There’s always another murder.”

“Another body was found in a trunk, sir. I’m afraid it’s another policeman.”

H
is name’s Sam Pizer,” Blackleg said.

Hammersmith was sitting with the criminal at a small round table in a pub five blocks from the Shaw residence. He had been late arriving and Blackleg seemed impatient. Judging by the number of empty mugs on the table, Blackleg hadn’t waited for Hammersmith before he began drinking.

“The chimney sweep, you mean?”

“Yeah. You been tippin’ the bottle already, copper? Y’act like yer on the deck of a sinkin’ ship. Yer weavin’ about on yer chair.”

“I was poisoned earlier today.”

Blackleg sat up and leaned forward. “What’d they use?”

“Benzene.”

“Aye, I’ve had it myself. You’ll be shipshape by the day after tomorrow. Plenty a sleep, plenty a water. That’ll do the trick fer ya.”

“I feared I might not wake up if I slept. I had a great deal of trouble the last time I awoke.”

“I never said it’d be fun to wake up. But unless you was already dead afore you come in here, you’ll wake up again.”

Blackleg gestured to the serving girl to bring another mug. He shook his head at Hammersmith.

“You’ll wanna be avoidin’ the drink, though, or your head’ll shoot clean off and to the moon.”

“Tea sounds lovely.”

“You’ll drink water.”

When the girl brought Blackleg’s ale, he asked her to bring his friend the biggest glass of water she could find. As he watched her go, Hammersmith noticed two tarts at a table across the room. They seemed familiar to him, and it appeared they’d been looking his way, but he couldn’t be sure. He turned his attention back to his tablemate.

“You said you’d discovered the chimney sweep’s name,” Hammersmith said.

“Right. Not easy to track down, neither.”

“Well, how did you do it?”

“You did the right thing, you did, settin’ a gonoph to find a gonoph.”

“A gonoph?”

“Somebody don’t mind gettin’ a little dirty in the pursuit of coin, right?”

“Oh. Understood.”

“I asked around a bit, here and there, nothin’ too indiscreet, you understand. Pressed a little of the coin you gave me into the right palms.”

Hammersmith winced. He’d given Blackleg half the grocery money for the month in order to help the criminal track the chimney sweep. He hoped Pringle would be able to come through with groceries for them both, or Hammersmith would have to tighten his belt again.

“Anyway, I found him in a flash house down the road a piece. He’s been talkin’ up his business, askin’ about for a kid might do as a climber. Seems he lost the climber he had.”

The girl interrupted them with Hammersmith’s water. She plonked it down on the table, rattling Blackleg’s empties, and turned on her heel before Hammersmith could thank her. Clearly she wasn’t impressed by men who drank water. Hammersmith saw the tarts across the room looking at him again and finally recognized them as the same two from the previous evening. The tall one had a distinctive scar across her face. He was still certain they had set the younger woman to bait him. He was surprised because this pub seemed a good bit nicer than that other one had. He smiled at them and raised his glass. The two women abruptly stood and hurried down a hall at the back of the pub. They were quickly out of sight.

Hammersmith shrugged and took a drink. The water burned his throat going down, and still unable to breathe through his broken nose, he felt a sudden panicky sensation, as if he were drowning. He set the glass down on the table and left it there.

“Where can I find him?” he said. “The chimney sweep. Where is he?”

“You don’t wanna go where he is, Mr Hammersmith.”

“I can handle myself.”

“Oh, no doubt of that. But you’d be outnumbered afore you got two words out, and I don’t like yer chances.”

“You go with me, then.”

He watched Blackleg size him up, taking in the ripped and soiled clothes, the broken nose, the eyes that wouldn’t focus properly. At last the criminal nodded.

“Aye, I guess I’d better go along, hadn’t I? Come with me.”

H
e knows.”

“He don’t know.”

Liza and Esme were in the alley behind their favorite pub. It seemed to be deserted except for dozens of broken crates stacked against the wall behind them.

“But that’s two times we seen him.”

“Did you hear his name?”

“I heard the other one call him it. I walked right by their table.”

“He’s on the beat, is all. Or havin’ a drink afore he goes home.”

“He ain’t drunk nothin’, though,” Esme said. “And Jonny’s on the beat round here, not him.”

“Could be Jonny’s ill.”

Esme gave Liza a look that said she was through arguing about it.

“Fine, then,” Liza said, “if he knows, he knows.”

Esme threw her hands in the air, clearly exasperated. She opened her mouth to speak.

“How much?”

Liza turned to see a man shambling out of the shadows behind the crates. He smelled like rye, and the four front teeth in his upper jaw were missing, leaving a gaping pink maw of need.

“I said, how much?” the man said.

Esme’s lip curled and she turned away, leaving Liza to deal with the potential customer. The man didn’t have a beard or mustache.

“We’re done for the night,” Liza said.

“Can’t be. It’s early yet.”

“We’re done when we says we is.”

“When I says you is, is when yer done.”

He reached out and Liza slapped his hands away.

“Hard to get, eh?” the man said.

But then he suddenly backed away from Liza, his hands up, and Liza turned to see Esme holding a pistol. The man tried to smile, his lips quivering, the black hole of his mouth twisted in a leer.

“No need for that, little lady. I was innerested in yer friend, anyhow. Don’t go in for big scars like the one you got there, not that you ain’t fetching. Let’s all be friends.”

“I have enough friends,” Esme said.

She pulled the trigger.

The three of them stood for what seemed a lifetime, waiting for the echo of the gun’s report to fade down the stone walls of the alley. When they could hear silence again, the man blinked at the two women and then collapsed, his knees buckling under him. He fell gradually, straight down and from the bottom up so that he appeared to be shrinking in on himself. When he had reached the ground, he finally slumped back, and Liza could see the blood flowing from his gut faster than his clothes could soak it up. The black fluid spread out, free of the flesh. The man sputtered once and did not move again or make another sound.

“You didn’t have to shoot, Esme. He was harmless enough.”

“I didn’t mean to.”

“Well, accidents happen. We’d best move on afore Jonny comes runnin’.”

Liza took the gun and shoved it to the bottom of her bag, and then she grabbed Esme by the elbow and dragged her through the door back into the pub. The back passage was empty, nobody running to investigate the sound of a gunshot. Liza let go of Esme’s arm and turned to face her.

“I really didn’t mean to shoot him, Liza.”

“I know, love. It don’t matter. Lord knows we done worse.”

“He didn’t have no beard like the others. Like—”

Esme closed her mouth, bit off the next word. It didn’t matter. Liza knew what she was going to say.
Like him.
Him. Saucy Jack, the great
bearded beast of Whitechapel. He had left his mark on Esme’s face and on her chest, and she still waited for him to return and claim her.

“He was a man, wasn’t he?”

“Aye. He was.”

“Then the beard don’t matter, whether it’s there or not.”

“The other ones, the ones we done up, they had the beard.”

Like him.

“The bluebottle don’t have it, neither.”

“Are we gonna do him up, too?”

“If we don’t wanna get caught we will.”

“He might not know.”

“You’re the one said he does.”

“That was afore I kilt that man back there. I don’t wanna kill no more, Liza.”

“We started somethin’.”

“I think it’s enough. None of ’em with beards was the one. And I don’t feel so mad no more.”

“What if I still do?”

“Oh, Liza.”

Esme stepped in close and put her hand on the back of Liza’s neck. She drew her in and Liza breathed the smell of her, sweat and smoke and mint, and Esme’s mouth was on hers and her body pushed in close. Warmth radiated out from Liza’s core. Her face flushed and she shut her eyes to contain it.

Esme broke the kiss and stepped away. Liza took a moment before opening her eyes. She smiled.

“All right, love,” she said. “Unless someone else gets in our way, the bluebottle will be the last one.”

“Only ’cause he knows it was us done the others.”

“Only ’cause he knows.”

“Good. Liza?”

“Yes, love?”

“What’s his name? The bluebottle, I mean. You said you heard the other one say his name.”

“Hammersmith. The other one called him Hammersmith.”

Esme nodded. “Then he’ll be the last one. We’ll kill Mr Hammersmith and be done with it.”

She smoothed her dress and led the way back into the pub.

W
e’ve come to see Inspector Little.”

Sergeant Kett looked up at the couple standing in the door of the back hall. The man had his hat in his hands and the woman had clearly put on her Sunday best to come round to the Yard on a Wednesday afternoon.

“Inspector Little’s unavailable,” Kett said. “What’s this regarding?”

“Our son,” the man said. He stepped forward just a bit, half a step. “Inspector Little was trying to find our missing son. We just wanted to know…”

The man broke off and smiled, but there was no warmth in it. That smile was the last vestige of hope on an otherwise thoroughly disappointed face.

“He’s our only boy,” the woman said.

“We got three girls,” the man said. “Only the one boy. We been waitin’ to hear, like the detective said to, but we need some news, sir. It’s got us torn up.”

“Inspector Little was moved to the Murder Squad not long ago,” Kett said. “That might be why you never heard nothin’.”

With so many missing in London every year, there was virtually no
chance their son would be found. They hadn’t received news because the overworked detectives rarely had any news to report in cases like theirs.

“Murder squad? Is our boy murdered?”

“Nothin’ to do with your boy.”

“Who do we talk to, then?” the woman said.

“I’ll take you back there.”

Kett rose and came around the desk. He gestured for the couple to follow and led them down the short corridor. Off to his left, at the end of the hall, the Murder Squad room was mostly empty. Oliver Boring sat munching on a biscuit and reading a file, but the place was otherwise empty, everybody away looking for Little’s killer. Kett pointed at the bustling hive of detectives in the bigger room to his right.

“You’ll be wantin’ one of them,” he said.

“But…” the man said. “But who?”

Kett led them to Inspector Gerard’s desk. Gerard was one of the better detectives who hadn’t been tapped for the Murder Squad. Kett made introductions all around.

“You’ll need to ask Inspector Day for the file,” Kett said. “He’s got all of Mr Little’s things.”

“Why’s that?” the father of the missing boy said.

“We’re reshuffling a bit,” Kett said.

If they hadn’t read the papers and didn’t know that Little was gone, Kett saw no reason to alarm them. Learning that the detective was dead might kill their spirits. And their spirits were all they had.