City of Darkness (City of Mystery) (43 page)

He’s like me, Cecil thought, the
notion coming on him abruptly, with the bitterness of cheap beer.  We’re men
who once knew greater means, men who thought their lives were destined for
different ends, but we’ve fallen on hard times, haven’t we?   The man’s coat,
while worn and dirty, had a certain quality. An elegance in the cut and Cecil
had always prided himself that he could recognize elegance, even when it was
tattered and concealed, just like this, in the tawdry streets of Whitechapel. 

He raised his beer in tribute and,
after a moment’s pause, the man raised his back.

6:25 PM

John emerged from an alleyway just
off Toddle Street, carrying his black bag at his side, and, walking swiftly,
began to make his way toward the waterfront.  This area was better lit than
most of Whitechapel, and as John passed under a street lamp, someone called his
name.  She had been searching the streets for him for twenty minutes, had sent
a note to his house, and she was shaking with relief at the sight of his tall
form silhouetted in the fog.   He turned at the sound of her voice and she
tumbled into his arms in relief.   They conferred, very briefly, and then
linked arms and started walking away from the water.

6:25  PM

“Well, o’course I wouldna bring a
baby here.”  The little man’s tone was offended, as if to suggest while it
might be morally permissible to sell a child, only a beast would put one in a
pram and push it to a tea house. “The baby should be with me wife, natural
enough, that’s where we be headed.”

“Then why did you ask us to meet you
here?” Leanna asked through gritted teeth.  Everything about the situation
smelled wrong but Emma only seemed bewildered.  She sat across from Leanna,
gripping her cup so tightly that it seemed the porcelain might crack at any
minute. 

“Ladies like you might not likely
meet old Georgy ‘less the place was posh, am I right?”  The man had probably
scrubbed up as well as he could, Leanna thought, but he still stood out in a
neighborhood tea room, surrounded by gossiping women and the occasional husband
treating his wife to a piece of pear tart.  Georgy kneaded his hands nervously
and looked from Leanna to Emma. “Money here, baby when ye follow,” he said.

“There’s isn’t a baby at all, is
there?”  Leanna said coldly.

But Georgy, thanks to Cecil’s planning,
was prepared for just such an inquiry.  They had found a blonde child toddling
about in an alley and offered her sister – this child herself no more than
seven – a shilling to let them cut a lock of the baby’s hair.  Even children
did not ask questions in the East End.  The older girl had promptly lifted the
baby up, slapping its rump when it squirmed, and Georgy had made a quick tug
with his pocketknife across a single curl.  The result was this lock of hair,
so soft, wispy and light that it clearly came from the head of a child, which
he solemnly unwrapped from a handkerchief and presented to the girls.

The effect on Emma was just what
Cecil had predicted.  A soft exhalation, the rise of tears, an almost
involuntary reaching for the hair.  But Leanna’s eyes remained narrow and
suspicious. “We only agreed to meet you in a public place,” she said.  “That
holds, so you had better find a way to summon your wife. And there will be no
money exchanged until the child is in our arms.”

And wasn’t she the duchess, Georgy
thought.  Micha would have a good time bringing her rump down to the street. 
The other girl was clearly more trusting, and as Emma raised the lock of hair
to her face and brushed it against her cheek, Georgy knew he had her thoroughly
hooked.  Let Miss High and Mighty try to set the rules, let her squawk like a
peahen, no matter.  The other one, the sweet one who was Mary’s sister….it was
clear she would follow wherever he led.        

6:45 PM

“Don’t worry, Sir,” Davy said, as the
Scotland Yard carriage made its way down Hanover Street.  “The area’s crawling
with bobbies and Miss Bainbridge has her guard up, else she wouldn’t have sent
the note.”

“True enough,” Trevor said tersely. 
He had been tapping his cane against the door the entire trip, a sound that had
driven Tom almost to the point of screaming.  “But they’re walking into a
trap.”

“There’s no way Mary had a baby?” 
Tom asked.

Trevor shook his head.  “In the past
four days I’ve interviewed everyone who ever knew the girl and there wasn’t so
much as a peep about a child.  It’s a play for money, that much is clear.  I
only hope that money is all they’re after.”

Tom was struggling to control his
breathing.  “What else would they be after?”

“Emma is Mary Kelly’s sister.  That
fact alone might make her a trophy, at least in the eyes of some.”

Davy leapt out before the carriage
had rolled to a complete stop in front of the Three Sisters.  Tom and Trevor
sat in strained silence for several minutes until he reappeared.

“They were here, Sir, the owner
remembered.   Came and went.  Sat at a table with a little man with dirty
clothes, the lady said.  And then Miss Bainbridge….” Here Davy stopped and
climbed back into the carriage, shaking off water.  It wasn’t raining, but the
fog had closed in fast.   “Miss Bainbridge was the one to pay, Sir, and she
left this with her money.”

He handed Trevor what looked to be
the standard sort of bill a server leaves on a café table.  The party had ordered
three cups of tea, and when Trevor turned it over he saw that Leanna had
scribbled a few words on the back.   How she had managed to do so undetected,
he could not imagine, and her scrawl was nearly illegible. But it was enough to
tell Trevor that they, like the women, had been misdirected.  He rapped on the
side of the carriage again with his cane and yelled “Merchant Street,
immediately” to the driver.  Then he sat back and looked into Davy and Tom’s
worried faces.

“It’s bad,” he said.  “I think he’s
trying to lure them to Whitechapel.” 

“They wouldn’t go to Whitechapel,”
Tom said.  It was such a preposterous notion that it almost made him feel
better.  “A baby is the perfect bait, no doubt about it, but neither of them
are fools.”

“They’re being led there in stages,”
Trevor said, running a palm across his face, for he had begun to sweat.  “Keep
an eye, Davy.  Tall blonde woman, shorter one with red hair, tiny dirty man.”  Mabrey
nodded and leaned out the window of the carriage, while Trevor turned back to
Tom.  “The first stop is perfectly respectable, a tea room full of ladies.  Then
he pulls them in a little deeper. Leanna’s note says they are now going to ‘a
public place,’ which scarcely points an arrow, but which I suspect means a pub. 
There are ghettos that skirt up right to the edge of Whitechapel, like the
Jewish area Abrams used to work.  Simple shops and homes, but the streets are
clean and well-lighted enough that Leanna and Emma might follow him without
question.  From there they are dangerously close to the East End.  A five
minute walk - ”

“Doesn’t this carriage go any
faster?” Tom said, yanking at the sleeves of his shirt.  He’d shucked the
bloody one he’d stolen from John back at the Yard in favor of a substitute
provided by Davy.  In the haste of their departure he had not asked who the
garment belonged to or why it might have been so readily available in the
mortuary.  The sleeves were short for Tom, but at least the shirt was clean,
and Tom tried not to think hard about its origins.

“We’re making good time,” Trevor
said.  “They’re almost certainly on foot, which is why Davy is hanging out the
window, making sure we don’t pass them. But I suspect this little man is
leading them through a lot of twists and turns, trying to disorient them so
they lose their sense of where they are and how long they’ve traveled.  We’ll
beat them to Whitechapel, that much is sure.  When we get there, we’ll tell
every copper we see who we’re looking for and the three of us will split up. 
Or at least Davy and I will take different routes and you can stand watch.  I
forgot about your ankle.”

“The ankle’s fine,” Tom said.  “I
won’t slow you up.”

Trevor looked into Tom’s ashen face
and gave what he hoped was a reassuring nod.  “And eventually we will find
them, especially if he takes them to a pub, as he most certainly plans to do.  The
man we’re looking for knew Mary Kelly, which means he most likely is from the
same neighborhood.”

“And that’s the good luck in this,”
Davy said over his shoulder.  “We’ve spent the last four days retracing Mary
Kelly’s steps so we know exactly where she’d go to find clients, the routes she
used to get there.  It isn’t as if we’re looking in every pub in the East End,
Sir.  We know where to start.”  His eyes turned back to the street.  “There’s a
limited number of people who could have sent that note, isn’t that true?  The
first one, the letter to Miss Emma about the baby, I mean.”

“Quite right,” Trevor said.  “Emma
was private, Mary evidently less so.  Even the people living in the same house
with Emma were unaware she had a sister but Mary must have confided in
someone.”

“I scarcely see how that narrows the
field,” Tom said.   It seemed the carriage was moving so slowly he was tempted
to jump out and run on foot.   “Could be any working girl she’d befriended.  Or
any regular client.”  

“It narrows the field because it
means that for once we can toss out the notion of a hoax, a completely random
person from the streets,” Trevor said.   “Remember what Leanna said in the
letter she sent to Scotland Yard.   The person who contacted them claimed the
baby was named Sarah, after Emma and Mary’s mother.  So it was someone close
enough to Mary to know that she had a sister, where that sister lived, and even
their mother’s name.”

“Someone who knew Emma would be able
to get a hundred pounds,” Davy added.  “That’s a lot of money for a maid, so
why would they ask it?”

“Perhaps they knew of Geraldine’s
generosity, her penchant for sad causes,” Trevor mused.  “Or perhaps whoever
wrote the letter didn’t understand that Emma was a maid.  They could have seen
a Mayfair address as evidence she had married well, had immediate access to
funds.” 

A sudden dreadful thought flitted
across Tom’s mind.  “Are we even certain Emma is the target?” he asked. 
“Leanna is the one with money.”

Trevor pursed his lips thoughtfully. 
“She comes from an established family….”

“It’s not just that,” Tom blurted
out.  “Our grandfather left her Rosemoral, the whole bloody estate, and that
makes her…..what did you call it?  If someone knew she was an heiress, that
would make her as much a trophy as Emma, would it not?”

What it made her was the ideal
candidate for a kidnapping, but Trevor did not share this particular thought with
Tom.  “How many people are aware of the terms of your grandfather’s will?”

“No one but family.  And a handful of
solicitors back in Leeds.”

“And the letter was sent to Miss
Emma, not Miss Bainbridge,” Davy reminded them.  “Whoever wrote it couldn’t
have known Miss Bainbridge would come with her.”

“Right again, Davy,” Trevor said. 
“Emma was Mary’s sister so we should start there, with the most obvious and
direct connection.  The lure of the baby was designed to tempt Emma. There’s no
reason to think Leanna’s wealth is even a factor.”

“She’s so trusting,” Tom said. “Too
trusting for her own good.”

“She was suspicious enough to send us
notes,” Trevor said.  “Leanna’s clever.  Smart enough to know they shouldn’t
follow the man to the second location.”

Tom shook his head.  “I was speaking
of Emma.”

7:10 PM

Mary Kelly had solicited the majority
of her clients from three pubs:  The Cornwall, the Pony, and the Prince of
Wales.  Trevor’s plan was to circulate through the area between the three,
informing any copper he saw along the way of the situation and providing a
description of the people they sought.  All they knew about the man was the tea
shop owner’s vague claim he was small and dirty, and Whitechapel was home to
any number of men who fit that description.  As for the women, Trevor hoped
that the mere fact they would be well-dressed and neatly groomed would be enough
to draw the eye in this part of town.   He sent Davy on a wider loop of the
area, since he still believed that the man was most likely leading Emma and
Leanna into the East End via one of the immigrant neighborhoods to the west.

Despite Tom’s promise that his ankle
was fine, it was immediately clear that he’d be unable to keep up the pace. Trevor
led him to the nearest of the three likely pubs, the Prince of Wales, and
deposited him at a table near the door with instructions to keep an eye on anyone
who entered.  His demotion from amateur detective to watchdog rankled Tom, but
he knew that Trevor was right.  He was a liability on the streets.  He had
begun to suspect the ankle was broken, although he didn’t share this with
Trevor for fear he’d be sent home altogether.  He propped it on the chair
across from him and stared anxiously out into the street where Trevor had
stopped to talk to a bobby.  Word of mouth spread quickly among the men on
their beats, Trevor had assured him, and there were more coppers on duty in the
East End now than in any time in memory.   By the time the women arrived via
their long and most likely circuitous route from Hanover Street, half of
Whitechapel would be expecting them.