Jane Steele (25 page)

“Tell them I ruined everything, that I always ruin everything.”

“Stop this,” he growled. “It was my own wretched fault. You are a young woman—intelligent, beautiful, vibrant. Why should you wish to live with a pair of ruined men in a house full of ghosts?”

“But I never minded that! Only you ought to be free to see ghosts without my demanding to know where the bodies are buried. I’ve always wanted too much, sir—your not wanting me back doesn’t make you culpable.”

“I never said I didn’t want you.”

“You could say it now,” I requested, heart hammering.

“No.” He glanced up at last. Whatever gnawed him, it had burrowed through to the bone. “I could
not
say that, Jane.”

“Heaven help me, this is madness.” I leant forward, half-seated on his desk and inches from his weathered features. “The whole truth, is that what you want—
my
truth in exchange for your own? It could quite literally cost me my life, I . . . You know what happened when Ghosh attacked me, and—”

“That was self-defence, you raving—”

“But I’d not care, I wouldn’t, not so long as you loved me. I should be the happiest woman on earth if you did. Anyone would be.”

“The last one wasn’t.”

I suspect something else would have happened there in that cosy study, our lips parted and eyes ablaze with both craving and restraint, had we not heard steadily approaching footfalls.

“Jane!” he protested when I pulled away, but I turned my back as he rose, composing myself, and so it was in the mirror above the hearth that I first saw the door swing open following a confident knock and Inspector Sam Quillfeather enter the room.

I did not scream; it was a near thing, however.

“Oh, gracious me, what was I thinking barging in so?”

Teeth set tight as a ship’s hull and eyes glued to the mirror, I took in Mr. Quillfeather. He had aged, but not diminished, and the perennial forward sweep of his spine and the exaggerated arches of his nose and chin and brow would already have imparted an impression of relentless momentum without the additional trajectory of his steel-grey shock of hair as he swept off his shabby beaver hat.

“Quillfeather.” My employer quickly forced his features into neutrality, but this only left him resembling a tattered shoreline after a squall.

“I’ll come back after surveying the cellar?” Mr. Quillfeather proposed, voice retaining the old questioning lilt. “I’m before my time, I see—yes, three full minutes! Won’t you forgive me? I’ll just—”

“No, no, it’s all right.” Mr. Thornfield coughed. “Inspector Sam Quillfeather, may I introduce Miss Jane Stone, Sahjara’s governess?”

There was nothing for it: I forced my fists to unclench and turned to face the gallows.

He might not recognise you, not after so many years and so much sorrow,
I told myself.

Gallantly, he made a neat bow over my hand; and then his eyes met mine, variegated hazel and canny as ever, and a spark flared to
life, and I was caught. For Highgate House had been mine before my disappearance and here I was again, and he could not help but know me.

“Mrs. Stone, I take it?” he clarified. “It is very good to see you again in these parts. A country widow and so young?”

“No indeed, she comes to us from London.”

Mr. Quillfeather studied me, and then Mr. Thornfield added his curious gaze to the already potent atmosphere, and I was just considering the benefits of throwing myself into the fireplace when the inspector waved his hand in the air.

“Of course, of course, I must have momentarily mistook her? The older I get, the more everything and everyone manages to remind me of, well, of something or someone else entirely? Pleased to meet you, Miss Stone.”

“Likewise,” I managed.

The floor was opening like a pit beneath me, gravity turned upside down.

“Was Miss Stone affected by these dreadful events?” Mr. Quillfeather asked, politely addressing Mr. Thornfield.

The trail of bodies, oh God, he knows, he must know, first Edwin for certain and then Vesalius Munt in all likelihood, and now there just happens to be another carcass needs burying and here I—

Mr. Thornfield hesitated not a whit. “Miss Stone arrived downstairs first following the crash which alerted us, and suffered injury at Jack Ghosh’s hands—but thankfully, he was already bleeding out. I’ll show you the window and the glass, naturally, but it’s all quite straightforward. Hoisted upon his own petard at last, if you’ll pardon my satisfied tone, Quillfeather.”

“Nothing to pardon, my good man! You suspect Sack’s behind this?”

“I should be a simpleton not to.”

“Yes, yes, we’ll work it out between us, won’t we? How was the young lady injured?”

“Torn scalp. It bled considerably, and she nary made a sound. If you ask me, the blackguard could have died for that alone and I should have said good riddance,” Mr. Thornfield droned in his haughtiest tone even as his eyes dared me to contradict him.

“Might I see, Miss Stone?” Sam Quillfeather asked gently.

What could I do? I bent my head, and Mr. Thornfield cupped my nape in a tender touch I did not think planned, and Mr. Quillfeather tutted, “Shameful, Thornfield, simply shameful,” and I raised my face after a gentle press to my neck preceded both men stepping back.

“What luck it was only a minor insult?” Again Mr. Quillfeather turned to Mr. Thornfield for confirmation, and the latter nodded curtly. Then the inspector glanced back at me.

“A painful hurt, and a lucky escape,” he repeated. “Frankly, it . . . reminds me of something, Miss Stone?”

A torn sleeve and a cousin dead at the bottom of a ravine.
My mouth turned instantly dry.

“Jane, why don’t you lie down for a little?” Mr. Thornfield suggested, the gash between his brows thickening. “These have been trying times, and for no one more than yourself. Go to the parlour and try the settee—I’ll be along after I post Quillfeather here, all right?”

“Just the thing—can you make it unescorted, Miss Stone?” the inspector asked, bending forward solicitously.

“Yes,” said I. “Please don’t concern yourselves.”

“We’ll talk further soon,” Charles Thornfield said, voice as tight as it was fond. “Sleep if you can, but we shouldn’t be more than an hour.”

“Take your time. Excuse me, gentlemen.”

When I walked into the corridor, I paused for only a second; one glance at the packed trunk persuaded me to leave it behind. It contained nothing I wanted, not without Mr. Thornfield, and I carried the cheque and my collection of letters in my reticule. Walking at first, then sprinting, I raced for the stables and ordered Nalin saddled and after stealing the horse he had given me, I rode hell for leather towards the village.

Some say there is enjoyment in looking back to painful experience past; but at this day I can scarcely bear to review the times to which I allude: the moral degradation, blent with the physical suffering, form too distressing a recollection ever to be willingly dwelt on.

I
left the spirited mare in the care of the inn, leaving explicit instructions that it should be returned to Highgate House and whatever man they sent would be compensated; this transaction complete, I booked a seat on the next coach with coin collected writing gallows ballads, which stock had not been depleted. Then I bought a penny roll and sat upon a bench outside the inn and began numbly to eat, knowing the miles ahead to be slow and dreary as the Thames.

I had an hour’s worth, more or less, of a head start, and the gallop had taken a mere ten minutes. The coach, meanwhile, should leave in half an hour, and
perhaps Mr. Thornfield has not yet been told by Mr. Quillfeather I pushed a child over a cliff and speared a headmaster through the neck, perhaps—

“Miss Stone?”

Thankfully I had forced the last of the roll down, else I should have suffocated; there stood Mr. Sardar Singh, warmly bundled, a sheaf of papers tucked under his arm, his the only head in the
sluggish trickle of pedestrians which had been wrapped in an elaborate configuration of sky blue (which doubtless accounted for the hostile stares). He was accompanied by Mrs. Garima Kaur, who was recording something in a small pocketbook; her gaunt face looked still more stark than usual, her eyes lost in the curves of her skull.

“Oh!” I exclaimed, shrinking. “What are you doing here, Mr. Singh?”

“Picking up blank death certificates for Charles from the village physician—we’re not quite outfitted fully, and are to meet with Mr. Sam Quillfeather today.”

“Yes, he’s there at the house.”

I knew I did not sound right; I hated that I did not sound right. Mr. Singh turned to Mrs. Kaur, conferring in Punjabi. She looked at me so oddly, a mingling of inquisitiveness and something I could not identify, that I averted my eyes; thus I only saw in my periphery that, after a muted request, Mrs. Kaur began walking briskly back in the direction of Highgate House.

“We are quite alone, Miss Stone, unless you wish it otherwise,” I heard Mr. Singh state.

My vision blurred until I was seeing from the bottom of a lake; then the bench squeaked and a hand was at my elbow.

“What in heaven’s name is— Has something else happened, Miss Stone?”

“Nothing to speak of.”

“Miss Stone, please know I would hold any confidence from you under eternal lock and key.”

“It isn’t that I don’t trust you.”

“Then please assure me that you’re all right,” he insisted more strongly.

Several seconds passed.

“I’m not all right,” I choked at last. “I cannot remain in Mr. Thornfield’s company.”

Ascertaining what the stuffy, sausage-smelling citizens of that hamlet thought of a Sikh dressed as an Englishman wrapping his arms around a governess as she sobbed soundlessly into his coat would be quite impossible, for I could see nothing whatsoever. However many stares we garnered, the activity served a dual purpose; my heart was breaking, so the simple comfort was appreciated; and if I keened over cruel fate and lost love, I should not have to explain I was also running away to London to escape execution.

“Yes, there . . . that’s better,” he said as I calmed. “Miss Stone, may I ask what brought matters to this state?”

His grey eyes were bright with compassion when I pulled away. After he had passed me his handkerchief and sat there patiently as the quaking in my shoulders lessened, I found I did indeed wish to speak with him, and still had fifteen minutes before my coach departed.

“Forgive me for making such a scene.”

“Not at all.”

“It’s just . . . the night I killed that scoundrel, Mr. Thornfield told me about your sister and Sahjara’s abduction and the trunk, and it’s horrible you were dragged into such a nightmare, and I know you both to be honourable, but he says he’s a murderer and he won’t say how or when, and he won’t say he doesn’t want me, he won’t say anything at all of consequence, nor touch me, nor trust me, and I
cannot bear it
any longer.”

“Ah,” he said. “Then your sorrow is partly my doing, and I have been gravely at fault.”

“Regarding?”

“Charles’s refusal to touch living people.”

My mouth must have gaped overlong for, passing his fingertips over his beard, he continued after a brief reflection.

“Charles emulates me, always has done. Even when I have tried to prevent him. But the specific point I am making, Miss Stone,”
Mr. Singh said, measuring his words, “is that I am both devout and monastic, and I think Charles may well have confused the two. I have never been married. I have no interest in marriage or its accompanying joys.”

I stared, yes, but he did not seem ruffled. “You have never loved, then?”

“That is not remotely what I meant,” he corrected mildly.

“Oh. You are . . .”

I trailed off, helpless; after he had registered shock, he shook his head.

“No,” he answered firmly. “Ah, I see why you—I beg your pardon. Yes, of course I love Charles, but no.”

I thought a little longer. “You are like a priest? Devoted to God and to study?”

“There we have it,” he approved before the shadow returned to his face. “But you must understand, it is very easy for someone who is not tempted by flesh to be celibate, and I have always been so—content to watch the moon rise, to try a new spice, to practise the
chakkar
but never use it to harm. When I was small, I dreamt of sitting under a tree, waiting for God to possess me with divine knowledge which would incinerate my very soul. If God told me to give up strong coffee, I would feel that loss keenly, and God would thus honour my sacrifice. But I do not actually long for the thing I abstain from—which is not abstinence at all. So I am simply wondering whether, in my own infinite ignorance, I contributed to this great error Charles has made.”

“Nothing you’ve said implies you were gravely at fault in any way.”

“Then I have not helped so much as I ought to have done.”

“Why should you help me?”

“Why should I not? Help Charles is what I meant, however.” He sighed. “His life, his body—I have told you already such sacrifices
occur in the Guru, but this is a needlessly raised shield after the battle has already left one bloody.”

“You’ve plenty to fear yet, it seems,” I reminded him, feeling Jack Ghosh’s fingers crushing my soft throat.

“That is a new battle,” he corrected, frowning. “I never dreamt of the old battle haunting us here save in ways you have already mentioned—our own. It’s most peculiar, if you ask me. This trunk business must have an end put to it, for Sahjara’s sake if not ours.”

And I shall help in any way I can
, I vowed to myself.

Mr. Singh’s face took on the quality of a death mask. “Did Charles tell you whom he murdered, if neither how nor when?”

I shook my head.

“Do not believe him, then, when he claims to be a murderer,” he said hoarsely. “Unless he has been killing other people than the one I am thinking of, he is not to be trusted on the subject.”

“I don’t know how many subjects he is to be trusted upon—he said he should never miss exile from the Punjab, for instance.”

“He and I are agreed.” His voice scraped now, a blade being sharpened upon a stone. “I loved Lahore, but to watch an empire sabotage itself so? We were all meant to be lions, but some of us proved unshorn dogs. Why do you suppose we are warriors, Miss Stone? It is because our Gurus have been sat upon red-hot iron plates and covered with scorching sand, sewn into raw hides which shrank and broke their bones, had pegs thrust in their heads and their brains removed when yet alive. My people have been slaughtered like animals, our cities sacked, children’s bellies slit, our sacred pool filled with our hacked-apart bodies, and for what? So we might throw away the richest land in all of Asia?” His hands spasmed into fists. “I was not exaggerating when I said my sister should have been maharani—instead, the Company butchered us like cattle. There is too much blood in the sands of the Punjab, Miss Stone.”

I did not know what to say. We watched the inching progression of a sweet-faced crone on the arm of her grandson, listened as the church’s bell sang salutations to the heavens, marked the stares slitting towards us in charcoal shadows of doubt and disgust.

“Mr. Thornfield implied that as long as you and Sahjara are here, he has all the home he requires.”

A smile barely brushed the corners of his lips. “He does us honour, then.”

Nodding bleakly, I checked the inn’s entrance. The carriage had clattered into the manure-strewn yard and I rose, indicating it to Mr. Singh with my eyes; he stood, looking appalled.

“But—
now
? Where is your trunk, where your farewell to the household, why—”

“I can’t.” I forced back the tears which newly threatened. “Please tell Sahjara I love her, and ask her forgiveness. If—when I see her again, I’ll be glad of it. Mr. Thornfield gave me a hundred pounds. I’ll be fine. I still have my knife to protect me from
badmashes.
”

I did not achieve a second smile, but the set of his lips did grow a shade less alarmed.

Clasping my hand, he said, “In that case, farewell, Miss Jane Stone, and send us word of your whereabouts at once. Should you ever wish to trade the name Jane Stone for Jane Kaur, however, you should make a wise and courageous Sikh princess, and must return to us immediately. I beg you to consider it—the return, at least, if not the new moniker.”

Walking towards the coach was like pulling my own skin off, but Mr. Singh helped by stepping back courteously.

“Keep them safe,” I called when I reached the tall step. “Parting from you, from Sahjara, from Mr. Thornfield—well, the poets are liars. It isn’t sweet sorrow at all, it’s like dying a little.”

Mr. Singh turned towards the half-timbered hostelry and Mr. Thornfield’s waiting carriage. “So often the way,” he agreed sombrely, “with partings.”

•   •   •

M
y journey to London was a clanking, frigid stretch of dull farms and weathered church spires during which none of the other passengers so much as snored in my direction. When I at last arrived in the city, still shaking from the road’s vibrations as well as nerves, I knew myself too sensible simply to crawl to a low lodging-house in Drury Lane and forget the sour bedclothes with the help of a pint of rum; so I walked for a few miles, stopping before the door of a seedy theatre for a ham sandwich with mustard and a tin cup of coffee.

Restored, I recalled a guesthouse called the Weathercock in Orchard Street, Westminster, where I had lived for a few weeks high on the hog with the best-paid and best-educated literary patterers. As I was already near Marylebone, travelling there by foot would be easy as blinking, so I thanked the sandwich man and set off.

All was as I remembered it, a pretty white-painted building with gas lamps aglow at either side of the broad front steps, and men of letters guffawing over politics in the lobby. When I rang the bell, the clerk expressed dismay at my lack of luggage; however, as I had the commodities of both tears and money at the ready, pleading railway thieves, I had soon obtained his sympathies, and he vowed to send the boots round for toiletries, laudanum (my pate ached something terrible, as did my heart), and a packet of tooth powder.

The Weathercock had a lending library for the consideration of 1d. per week, to be paid upon Sundays, but I further endeared myself to the establishment by paying for this privilege immediately, made a selection based upon the volume having slipped down against its cohorts in a defeated diagonal posture, and took a glass of hot brandy and lemon to my room.

After a desolate time spent nursing that toddy—though no tears, for the rest of them had taken up residence in Mr. Singh’s coat—I
had produced a plan of action. This was three-pronged, and intended the following goals be achieved:

—Remove all threat from the lives endangered by Augustus P. Sack

—Ascertain whether you are the heiress of Highgate House

—Escape the clutches of Mr. Sam Quillfeather and avoid the noose

Penning this last, I shivered. Inspector Quillfeather may well have forgot everything, may well have indulged his friend Charles Thornfield, may well even have wanted to see the corpse before leaping to conclusions; but I had witnessed his absolute recognition of me, had heard him suggest I must have been a widow in a polite effort to explain why he was addressing a Stone and not a Steele. Sam Quillfeather was decorous and might even be kind; Sam Quillfeather was not stupid, however, and he had just examined the body of yet another chap slaughtered by my hands.

By my calculation, knowing where I stood upon these matters now that I had vanished would take me no more than a fortnight; resolving them, no more than a few months. I had enough money to live for some two years with only the hundred pounds Mr. Thornfield bestowed, provided I practised economy, and meanwhile the boots had delivered a fresh evening edition to my room with my other requests, and the paper was chock-full of executions. With hard work added to the formula, it would be enough; I might linger here, and so bury myself in projects that no one should see I was transparent by daylight, a ghost with a soul of smoke and secrets.

Once resolved, I picked up the edition I had selected upon a whim, and began the novel.

There was no possibility of taking a walk that day. . . .

•   •   •

I
t will seem peculiar to the reader, doubtless, but I awoke to my exile feeling much refreshed the next morning.

After all, I had a set of purposes; the frenzy of fright I had been driven into by the reappearance of Sam Quillfeather was quite dampened here in the world’s greatest cesspool; and the daily agony of seeing Charles Thornfield as if through a glass case in a museum display had ended. Additionally, London crackles and buzzes; it spits and it decays and it shines. I had missed it without knowing, so engrossed had I been by my new companions, but now I felt afresh the energy a metropolis can infuse into its strivers.