The Penny Dreadful Curse (13 page)

“Some other
time, perhaps?”

“Yes, of
course,” he said blinkingly.

The Countess
found a teashop near the Barley Hall and had an early lunch while
she pondered what to do next. Unlike Inspector Bird, she didn’t for
a minute believe the death of the boy yesterday morning to be
unrelated to the five murders they were investigating. She didn’t
believe it to be a robbery either. It was too brutal for that.
There was no need to hang the boy to get the parcel he was
carrying. The boy was so malnourished he would hardly have put up a
struggle. A thief could have knocked him senseless with one blow,
stolen the parcel and been long gone before the boy even thought to
cry out, assuming he would even bother. That suggested the parcel
he was carrying was more important than Mr Dicksen led her to
believe - important enough to kill for. Ipso facto, the scrap of
paper with the initials BB must be more important too, otherwise
why cling so tightly? Why would the boy refuse to relinquish a
scrap of paper while being lifted off the ground by the scruff of
the neck by a villain he knew would not be denied the spoils?

By the time
the Countess finished her lunch she knew she had to speak to Boz,
the boy who had retrieved the scrap of paper. She knew Boz was a
mudlark but she could hardly go searching for him on her own. A
lady wading through the Fishpond or scouring the riverbank was out
of the question. That was a job for her manservant, Fedir, but
before she sent him to track the boy down she would first try Miss
Carterett, the school mistress who seemed to be held in high regard
by the Snickelwayers. Miss Carterett might know where Boz could be
found when he wasn’t out mudlarking.

“The Quaker
School on Northbrick Lane,” she directed as she clambered into a
hansom.

Quakers were
renowned for their lack of ostentation and their school house was
no different. It was constructed from red brick with a pitched roof
of grey slate tiles. Fronting the street was a large black door
that led straight into a coat room. Coat hooks ranged around the
walls on which hung a multitude of scarves, hats, coats, mittens
and bags. It was the only messy part of the building.

Miss Carterett
was seated behind her desk in the schoolroom; before her stretched
five equal rows of ten desks. The children, ranging in age from six
to twelve, were busy transcribing ‘The quick brown fox jumps over
the lazy dog.’ from the blackboard onto their slates, endeavouring
to emulate the beautiful copperplate lettering of their teacher.
The sound of a pin dropping would have been deafening.

Several
children looked up from their work and word quickly spread by way
of elbows and kicks to ankles that a visitor had arrived, and not
the dreaded school inspector but a fashionable young lady, such as
usually graced the pages of storybooks they were permitted to look
at but not touch.

Miss
Carterett, writing feverishly, immediately closed the large tome
which housed her lesson plans, and looked up quizzically,
recognition dawning but the foreign name eluding her.

“Good-morning,” she said pleasantly.

“Hello, we met
last night at the theatre. My name is Countess Volodymyrovna. I was
wondering if I might have a word with you. I won’t take up much of
your time. I can see you are extremely busy.” She turned and smiled
luminously at the pupils, agog now with curiosity, their
concentration ruined.

Miss Carterett
picked up the little bell on the corner of her desk and gave it a
tinkle. The children immediately put down their stick of chalk and
put their hands on their heads.

“You have all
been working so diligently we will break ten minutes early for a
short playtime. Please put on your warm coats - monitors helping
the younger children – and make your way into the yard. No
running!” She watched as they rushed for the coat room. “Peter –
what did I just say about running?” The question was rhetorical but
Peter immediately slowed down to a safe gallop. An extra playtime
was not something worth risking.

Miss Carterett
waited until the last child filed into the yard. “Follow me into
the scullery. I can have my cup of bouillon while we chat. I’m
afraid I’ve only got enough for one but I can make you a cup of
tea. What did you want to speak to me about?”

The Countess
explained she had just had lunch. “I came to speak to you about a
boy called Boz. He is about six years old and is one of the
Snickelwayers.”

The school
mistress looked back over her shoulder, mildly surprised, while she
put a small saucepan of beef broth on the coal range to heat up.
“Yes, I know Boz. He’s Gin-Jim’s younger brother, the boy who was
murdered yesterday. He sometimes comes to class but more often than
not he plays truant and goes mudlarking.”

The news that
Boz was Gin-Jim’s brother took the Countess by surprise. Neither Mr
Corbie nor Patch had mentioned it. “Younger brother?’

Miss Carterett
nodded as she stirred her beef bouillon. “Yes, is he in some sort
of trouble? Has he been caught pilfering purses again?”

“No, no,
nothing like that, I just wondered if you could tell me where I
might be able to find him. I’d like to speak to him about his
brother’s murder.”

Miss Carterett
poured her steaming bouillon into a large china cup and hugged it
with both hands. “He doesn’t have a regular home so I can’t give
you an address and now that his brother is dead I think he will
probably wander around a bit from group to group in a sort of daze.
If he’s lucky Patch will take him under his wing. I’ll speak to the
boys who come to reading lessons this evening and let them know you
want to speak to him. I think it’s more likely he will find you,
rather than the other way around, as long as he doesn’t think
you’re going to cause him any grief. The boys who inhabit the
Snickelways are wary of adults, even the well-meaning ones. They’ve
been betrayed once too often.”

Gladhill sat in
an enclave of fine Georgian homes set in leafy gardens just off
Goodramgate and offered a superlative view of the Minster from its
double bay windows. A small porch separating the double bays
greeted visitors lucky enough to be invited to the home of York’s
most celebrated author, Mr Charles Dicksen.

Dinner in the
Dicksen household was served at precisely a quarter past six
regardless of the number of guests, the occasion, or any upsets
that may have occurred during the day. The nine children, including
the youngest who was only two, ate their dinner at four o’clock and
woe betide any child who arrived with unwashed hands.

Dr Watson and
Countess Volodymyrovna arrived half an hour prior to dinner as
instructed per the invitation. They had both dressed formally in
the belief that it would appeal to Mr Dicksen’s vanity. The
Countess decided to wear a favourite gown of emerald green velvet
with a daring shawl collar which came with a matching cloak edged
in bright green marabou feathers that looked frightfully swish.
Their host and the other two guests were already in the parlour.
The hostess was conspicuous by her absence.

Mr Dicksen
conducted introductions with brisk aplomb. Reverend Finchley they
had already met. He was blinking nine to the dozen as though the
electric glare of the chandelier hurt his eyes. Sir Marmaduke
Mallebisse was about mid-thirties, thick-necked, an outdoorsy type,
muscular and athletic, with one of those complexions which reddens
easily from wind, sun, changes in temperature and standing in close
proximity to coal fires. He was starting to resemble a red brick
wearing a blond toupee. A keen sportsman, he had just returned from
a stint of big game hunting in Africa, having bagged two lions, a
giraffe, a rhinoceros, a zebra and a trio of elephants. He was
having them mounted, except for the zebra which would become a rug,
and the elephants which were having their jumbo legs turned into
umbrella stands. He used words like ‘jumbo’ a lot, along with
‘crikey’ and ‘dandy’. The end of his sentences finished with the
word ‘what’ more frequently than not. It went something like this:
Crikey, but that is a dandy view of the Minster through this jumbo
window, what!

He was easy to
talk to, mostly because he did most of the talking, mostly about
big game hunting. The listener was merely required to nod, look
suitably impressed, and occasionally appear wide-eyed. What he had
in common with an indoorsy man like Mr Dicksen was one of those
social mysteries that are never adequately understood, though if
the author was looking for a big game hunter to caricature, Sir
Marmaduke would fit the bill nicely.

Sir Marmaduke
was holding court, regaling his captive audience with the perils of
waterholes at dusk, what, when Mrs Henrietta Dicksen made a
discrete entrance directly behind the butler who came to announce
that dinner was served. It was a quarter past six. A less
suspicious person might have said her entrance was fortuitous and
well-timed. Someone of the opposite persuasion might have said her
entrance was deliberate and exquisitely executed. Dr Watson was of
the former persuasion, the Countess tended toward the latter.

The big game
hunter was rudely cut off at the knees mid-stream, or should that
be mid-waterhole, what, by his indoorsy host.

“I thought we
agreed you would remain in your room, Henrietta?” The tone was
sharp.

She
straightened her shoulders and gave a dignified tilt of her chin.
“I did not want to give our esteemed guests the impression that I
am unsociable.”

“What about
your medical condition?” he reminded, glaring at her swollen
girth.

“My condition
is not medical and it should not render me unsociable.”

“Nonetheless,
it is unseemly.”

‘Perhaps to a
man, but to a woman it is a fact of life. Women are no longer
required to closet themselves away for nine months. York may be a
medieval city but we no longer live in the Middle Ages. And this
is
my home.”

“You will
throw the staff into disarray.”

“I have
already spoken to Tavlock. He has already set an extra place at
table.”

“What about
the acids and flux you have been suffering from? You have barely
been able to look at food? The sight of dinner will make you
ill.”

“If I feel
unwell I will excuse myself. Our guests will understand.”

“You will make
a spectacle of yourself as usual, Henrietta!”

With that
rebuke, their host took himself off to the dining room, leaving no
one in any doubt as to who was making a spectacle of whom. Dr
Watson, ever tactful, followed on the heels of their host after
checking to make sure his companion was being offered a chivalrous
arm. The Countess clung to the muscular limb that was proffered and
was about to follow the doctor when she noticed Reverend Finchley
and Mrs Dicksen hanging back somewhat conspiratorially by the jumbo
window. They were definitely up to something. She took a few steps
toward the door before feigning lightheadedness and leaning heavily
on her escort.

“Oh,” she
panted breathily, “let me collect myself before we go any further,
Sir Marmaduke.”

The big game
hunter drew himself up stiff and sharp. “Crikey, but these dandy
drawing rooms can be hotter than the equator. They make the
savannah seem like a jumbo ice box, what.”

“Oh, quite,
quite,” she agreed, fanning her face with her hand whilst
attempting to listen in on the private
tête a tête
in the
bay. Lip-reading was not an easy skill to master but it certainly
helped that the couple was facing into the room. Or maybe not. She
could have sworn Mrs Dicksen said: The door was locked as usual. He
must have the key on him. And the deacon replied: We’ll never get
in. It’s hopeless. At which stage she patted her cousin’s hand
reassuringly: I’ll keep trying. Don’t despair…

Dinner started
with oyster soup and, since the women were outnumbered two to one,
a heated discussion about the strategic military failures of the
Boer War ensued.

“I hear that
pompous arse, Winston Churchill,” declared Mr Dicksen scathingly,
“has travelled to Natal as a reporter for the Morning Post.”

“Crikey, the
namby-pamby dandy will get himself captured and shot, what,”
declaimed the big game hunter.

“No great
loss,” observed their host sardonically.

“Personal
recklessness is one thing,” volunteered the deacon, “but a man who
endangers a woman in the pursuit of career advancement is
reprehensible. I believe his partner was talked into accompanying
him.”

“I believe she
went of her own accord,” observed the Countess blandly.

“A theatre of
war is no place for a lady,” countermanded the doctor
stridently.

Mrs Dicksen,
not wishing to fan the flames of her husband’s ire and possibly
secure her own banishment, tactfully refrained from comment.

“How is the
murder investigation coming along, Countess?” enquired their host,
changing the topic rather suddenly.

“Painfully
slowly,” she replied frankly.

“The murders
happened before we arrived in York,” expounded Dr Watson, a note of
frustration creating an edge to his tone. “There was very little to
see at the murder scenes and all our leads have led nowhere.”

“I believe the
victims were all authoresses of penny dreadfuls,” interposed the
deacon.

“Crikey, those
blasted things!” blasted Sir Marmaduke. “If any lad at the
chocolate factory or on my jumbo property is caught with one of
those wretched rags he gets his marching orders on the spot. Why do
the working classes need to learn to read anyway? It will do them
no dandy good whatsoever, what! Upset the natural social order,
that’s all! Farm animals know their place, and so must working men
know it too!”