Newbury & Hobbes 04 - The Executioner's Heart (6 page)

Bainbridge raised an eyebrow. “The Prince of Wales? Have they finally managed to get you up to the palace?” The incredulity was evident in his voice.

Newbury shook his head. “No. He called on me, just a few hours ago.”

Veronica almost laughed out loud at the expression on Bainbridge’s face as he received this news. “What? At Chelsea?” he blurted out.

“Indeed so.”

“Good God. You’ve reduced the monarchy to making house calls, Newbury! What the devil did he want?”

Newbury smiled. “We can discuss that later. Let’s get this business over and done with first.” He turned to Angelchrist. “Good afternoon, Archibald,” he said.

“Likewise, Sir Maurice. Always a pleasure.”

Newbury glanced over at Veronica. “I take it you’ve been introduced to Miss Hobbes?”

Both Bainbridge and Angelchrist looked utterly crestfallen. “Oh … how utterly inconsiderate of me,” said Bainbridge, taking two strides towards her. “My dear, I’m so sorry. I’ve rather let myself down. I just got caught up in the conversation…”

“I fear we’ve neglected you, Miss Hobbes. We’ve been a little preoccupied, but nevertheless, it’s utterly unforgivable.” Angelchrist came to join her and Bainbridge, taking her hand. “It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

Veronica lowered her handkerchief and smiled. “Indeed, Professor. I’ve heard a great deal about you,” she lied, studying his face to gauge his reaction. He nodded thoughtfully, as if the idea didn’t overly concern him.

Now that he was standing before her, she had to admit he didn’t seem all that sinister. He was a smart-looking man in his early to mid-fifties, just a little older than Bainbridge. His hair was thinning and grey, and his moustache was neatly trimmed and still mostly black with a few flecks of white. He was shorter than Bainbridge by a few inches, and his face was careworn and friendly and creased easily around the mouth when he smiled. His eyes were a deep, warm brown.

“Right,” said Newbury, coming up behind the two men and clapping his hands. The sound ricocheted off the tiled walls. “Tell me about your corpses, Charles.”

“You don’t have to sound so enthusiastic about it,” said Veronica, although she was careful to keep any disapproval out of her voice.

Newbury laughed as he followed Bainbridge over to the three trestle tables and their gruesome occupants. She decided to wait with Professor Angelchrist, who, like her, was content to watch the proceedings from a safe distance. She noted the mortuary attendant had slipped away during their conversation.

“Three victims,” Bainbridge began, indicating each of the corpses in turn with a swift chopping motion. “All killed in the same fashion within the space of a week. No obvious links between the victims, although we are continuing to explore that possibility. Each of them has been opened up in the same way, and their hearts removed.”

“Hearts removed?” Newbury echoed, leaning over so that he might peer into the open chest cavity of the nearest victim, the young man who had so fascinated Veronica earlier. He wrinkled his nose at the festering scene inside.

“Yes. We’re wondering if there’s any ritualistic or occult significance,” said Bainbridge. There was a tinge of hopefulness—even desperation—in his tone. Veronica felt for him. It was an awful job, and an even more awful responsibility, to be the one accountable for bringing the killer to justice. More so, for explaining to the victims’ families exactly why their loved ones had been so brutally executed.

“Where were they found?” asked Newbury, circling the grisly diorama, drinking in the facts. “Indoors, evidently.”

“In their own homes,” Bainbridge confirmed. “The first one, the young man, here, had been dumped in his bathtub for the servants to find the next morning. The makeshift surgery had clearly been performed in the same bathroom, too; the walls had pretty much been redecorated with the poor bastard’s blood.” He sighed heavily as he moved round to stand over the corpse of the older man. “This chap, Mr. Geoffrey Evans, was found in his kitchen by his wife, who woke up in the middle of the night, realised he wasn’t there beside her, and went downstairs to look for him. He was spread out on the tiles in a sea of his own blood. And this last woman was discovered by her maid this morning on the floor of her expensive library. This one’s slightly different, though. The victim clearly put up a fight. There were signs of a struggle at the scene, and you can see the wounds on her forearms where she raised them in self-defence.”

Newbury lifted the woman’s right arm and studied the crisscross pattern of gashes. “It looks as if the killer came at her with a long-bladed knife,” he said.

Bainbridge nodded.

“You mentioned the occult. Did you find anything at the scenes that might suggest as much? Any symbols marked out in chalk? Icons drawn in the spilt blood? Tatters of paper covered in strange runes and secreted upon the bodies?”

“No,” Bainbridge admitted. “No, none of that. I only thought there might be some significance behind the removal of their hearts.”

“So you have no motive, and nothing to connect the victims?” Newbury was chewing on his bottom lip, lost in thought.

“Nothing. The only thing I’m sure about is that it’s the work of the same killer,” replied Bainbridge.

“Well, you’re right about that. You can tell from these wounds that the victims were all hacked open with the same implement, cutting through the breastbone in the same direction. But why? Why would the killer take their hearts?” He tapped his foot in frustration, as if that might be enough to conjure up an answer.

Bainbridge sighed. “I was rather hoping
you
were going to tell
me
that,” he said, resignedly.

Newbury looked up from the corpse of the woman. “Well, I don’t think there’s a particular occult ritual being performed here, or at least not one that I’m aware of, but there’s definitely something
ritualistic
about the manner in which they all had their hearts removed. It may look like a crude job, but whoever did this took real care over the removal of the organs themselves. Yes, they’ve hacked open the chest cavities in a rather barbaric fashion, but they’ve shown a strange sort of respect for the hearts they were stealing.”

“Almost as if they wanted them for something else?” said Veronica from behind her handkerchief.

“Absolutely that,” replied Newbury, glancing at her. “Although for what, I’m not at all sure.”

“Witchcraft?” asked Bainbridge. “Some Godforsaken nonsense involving human sacrifice and dancing in the woods? Isn’t that usually the way? I thought it might have something to do with that cabal, the ‘horny beasts’ or whatever it was they called themselves.”

“The Cabal of the Horned Beast,” interjected Veronica, trying not to laugh.

The three of them—Veronica, Newbury, and Bainbridge—had encountered members of this strange devil-worshipping cult just a few months earlier. Newbury had liberated a rare book of rituals from them, from which he derived his unusual treatment for Veronica’s sister, Amelia. As an act of reprisal, the cultists had taken Newbury and Bainbridge prisoner. Veronica had been forced to mount a rescue, posing as a cultist and battling one of their abysmal half man, half machine creations to gain entry to the manor house in which they’d established their lair.

Newbury sighed. “I only wish the world were that simplistic, Charles,” he said, sadly.

“Or perhaps the killer is reusing the organs, like those automatons with the ‘affinity bridges’ in their craniums. Could the killer be using them to power some sort of infernal machine?” Bainbridge continued, hopefully.

“It’s all possible, Charles,” said Newbury, “but at present I have no means of even theorising. There’s simply not enough information to go on.”

“There are three corpses!” protested Bainbridge. “How much information do you need? Have you even examined them properly?”

Newbury shrugged. “Context is everything. I need to see the victims in situ. If there was anything more to be gleaned from the manner of their deaths, it was lost the moment they were moved. You know that, Charles. There’s nothing else for me to see here. Sometimes a corpse is enough. This time … well, I’m afraid not.”

Bainbridge’s shoulders dropped as he recognised the truth in Newbury’s words. “Then there’s very little we can do. We’ll have to wait to see if the killer strikes again.”

“I fear so,” said Newbury. “I can carry out some research, and I can speak to Aldous Renwick in the hope that we can find some significance behind the missing hearts. Otherwise, we’re impotent until the killer shows their hand. I wish I could offer you more, but I have nothing. Not yet.”

Bainbridge gave a curt nod. He was clearly frustrated, although it was clear he didn’t blame Newbury for being unable to offer up a neat solution.

“Would it help if you were to visit the scene of the most recent murder?” offered Angelchrist, who’d otherwise remained silent throughout the proceedings.

“Perhaps,” said Newbury. “It really depends on how much has already been disturbed.” He glanced at Bainbridge questioningly.

Bainbridge shook his head. “They’ve already started to clean up. The place was a terrible mess. Abominable. I’d never have imagined so much blood could have been contained in a single human body.” He issued a long, heartfelt sigh. “You’ll talk to Aldous, then?”

“I will,” replied Newbury. “If there’s anyone who can find a ritual involving human hearts, it’s Aldous. It may take him some time, however. And it may come to nothing. We don’t know yet that there
is
any occult or ritual significance to the theft. It may simply be an obscene fetish that’s driving the killer to act as he is, taking trophies from his victims for his own gratification.”

“Let us hope you’re wrong,” said Angelchrist, darkly. “Otherwise we have even less to go on than we thought.”

The four of them stood in silence for a moment, as if weighing the implications of Angelchrist’s words. A killer with no motives other than simple self-gratification. A murderer who chose his victims at random, leaving no clear pattern behind, no evidence besides a brutalised corpse without a heart. Veronica knew it would be like searching for a needle in a proverbial haystack.

“I’ll send word to Aldous as a matter of urgency,” said Newbury, coming around from behind the trestle table that bore the corpse of the woman. He looked to Veronica. “First of all, however, I have some business I must attend to with Miss Hobbes.”

“My thanks to you, Newbury,” said Bainbridge. “I feel as if our chances of success have improved tenfold, simply by virtue of having your assistance. It’s been too long.” He patted Newbury on the shoulder. “I’ll be in touch.”

“See that you are, you old fool,” replied Newbury, chuckling as Bainbridge affected mock hurt. He turned to Angelchrist. “Until next time, Archibald.”

“Indeed, Sir Maurice. I trust we’ll speak again soon. And you, Miss Hobbes. I hope you will forgive me for capitalising so much of Sir Charles’s time this afternoon.”

“Of course,” said Veronica, diplomatically. “I’m sure we’ll meet again.”

Newbury held out his arm for Veronica and she took it gratefully, keen to put some distance between herself and the cadavers. He led her towards the exit.

“We have business to attend to?” she asked quietly, so that the others would not catch her trailing words as they walked.

“Indeed we do, Miss Hobbes. I believe it’s high time we paid another visit to your sister.”

Veronica squeezed his arm in grateful acknowledgement. “To Malbury Cross, then. I have a hansom waiting outside. Once you’ve attended to Amelia, I’ll see that you have time to write to Aldous, too.”

She leaned a little closer into Newbury, ignoring the imperious look of the mortuary attendant as they bid him good afternoon and stepped out into the drizzly late afternoon.

CHAPTER

6

The incense was thick and heady, and it lodged in the back of Amelia’s throat, making it difficult for her to breathe. She had no idea what the perfume was: lavender, most definitely, but something else, too, something unfamiliar, herbal, sharp. Accompanying this floral bouquet was a cloying tang of iron, which she really hoped wasn’t blood, but fully suspected was.

Not that she would have been able to tell. The room was shrouded in darkness. The heavy drapes were pulled across the windows to banish the watery afternoon sunlight, and the only other light source came from the five white candles arranged in a star pattern around her. She was kneeling on bare wooden floorboards at the centre of a strange pattern marked out in chalk: a complex geometric shape encompassing a five-pointed star, with unfamiliar glyphs and runes etched around it in a wide outer circle. She’d been told that she should never break the chalk pattern or step outside of its barriers while the ritual was being performed.

As a result she sat stock-still, despite the fact that the rough floorboards hurt her knees and her back ached terribly. She was worried that, should she make even the slightest of movements or unknowingly break one of the fine chalk lines with her hand or foot, she might disturb the ritual. She hadn’t been told what the consequences of such an action might be, but she was anxious not to find out.

Newbury sat opposite her within the chalk pattern, murmuring gently as he read from the pages of an ancient, leather-bound book. Amelia had tried making sense of the incantation, but had so far been unable to understand a word of it. It sounded as if Newbury was speaking in an eastern tongue, all glottal stops and rasping sounds made in the back of his throat. The book’s spine read
The Cosmology of the Spirit
, and from what scant glimpses she’d gotten of its contents, she’d ascertained that its pages were covered in an impenetrable scrawl, along with diagrammatic sketches and patterns akin to the one on the floor they now sat on.

Newbury traced his finger across a page, reading from right to left as if working backwards through the text. The concentration on his face was intense, his forehead creased in a deep frown. His head was slightly bowed, meaning she couldn’t see his eyes in the candlelight, just deep, pooling shadows. The effect was a little eerie, particularly when combined with the bizarre nature of their situation.