When I was fifteen and living with my family in Enfield, a businessman and his family moved into the area. They took up residence in the grandest house, hired a dozen servants and starting riding around the town in a regal carriage pulled by two black horses who picked up their hooves like dancers. He was in the jute business, making cheap cloth for sacks and cart covers, and had taken a share in a mill at Ponder’s End, employing dozens of local men. My father was deeply impressed. He talked about it every time we sat down to dinner:
‘Mr Thackery said the jute crop looks very promising this year.’
‘Have you seen the walled garden Mr Thackery has built? It might be the best in Middlesex.’
‘Mr Thackery thinks the Liberal government will fall soon.’
And so on, until we were all sick of hearing about him.
My father started angling his sermons towards Mr Thackery’s interests too, beseeching his flock to work hard and show due respect for their betters. At the time I took no interest, but afterwards I concluded he must have been hoping for a substantial donation to the church or to achieve the kind of influence that might one day lead to a bishopric.
My mother had a different objective. The Thackery family had two sons, one very small, but the other, John, was a year or so older than me. She invited the Thackerys to tea and placed John and me on the velvet settee together, casting sidelong glances at us while Mrs Thackery instructed her on crochet hooks and the men talked about the disestablishment of the Irish Church, which they naturally opposed, and the exorbitant cost of labour.
John was a pleasant lad, I thought, and quite amusing. Not for one second did he honour his father, instead rolling his eyes quite blatantly at Mr Thackery’s more grandiose outpourings. He even made a sly motion of slitting his own throat when he heard he was expected to go into the army, making me snort audibly, garnering a frown from my mother and a smirk from my older sister, Jane, who was newly engaged to be married and plainly found my discomfort amusing.
I rarely saw John over the summer, and it was not until mid-October that we spoke properly. The congregation was milling around after a morning service, and we found ourselves on the same bench, swishing the autumn leaves with our feet. Outside of his parents’ orbit he was surprisingly shy, and sat fiddling with his fingers, gazing mutely at the tombstones, until he hit upon the idea of making up biographies for the deceased.
‘Edith Charm, beloved wife and mother, seventeen ninety-two to eighteen fifty-five. She was a local witch, you know. She cursed the village men and turned them into dogs.’
I laughed, imagining what my father would say to that. ‘What a horrible story.’
‘Yes, it was. They attacked each other with tooth and fang, until every last one of them was dead.’
‘How unkind.’
‘Not at all.’ He attempted to centre his necktie, without success. ‘They deserved it. They’d tried to trap her, you see, and imprison her in a cage.’
‘But still.’
‘And it was for the best in the end.’ He pointed towards the fields stretching out in the distance, beyond the houses. ‘Afterwards, she turned herself and her friends into sheep, so they could live together freely and without violence. No dogs left to bite them or humans to confine them.’
When it was time to go, he was awkward again. He probably knew what my mother had in mind, and was embarrassed, believing I wanted it too. Nothing could have been further from the truth. I was already saving for my escape, earning threepences for teaching arithmetic to local children. But I was fascinated by how he talked, how he held himself, how he took up space on the bench, his legs splayed out or one foot propped up on the opposite knee. He was my model, my exemplar, far more so than Oliver, my older brother, who was away training for the army and already a man. Oliver was born a man, somehow. He had reached my father’s height, over six feet, by the age of sixteen, and at nineteen he was broad and strong enough to pick up a pew on his own. I could never be like Oliver. But John was boyish and slight, with a diffident manner and a sharp wit. I could imagine myself like him.
On the day I left home, tearing myself from my mother’s arms and dashing down the hill towards the station, actually passing my father coming the other way without him so much as glancing at this slim young man with reddened eyes and badly cut hair, I never considered I might see John Thackery again.
And now here he was, eleven years later, turning up like a ghost, dragging the chains of my previous existence behind him.
He was as crumpled as I remembered, wearing loose trousers and a bowler hat with a boot-shaped dent in the brim. But there was something curious about his clothes: despite his dishevelment, I would have expected them to be expensive, made of good-quality cloth and lined, as befits the elder son of a wealthy mill owner. But these were the garments of a man who worked for a living. He resembled a university professor fallen on hard times.
‘We need to talk properly,’ he said, his tone pleasant but firm. ‘I have an office here we can use.’
‘I’m very busy,’ I replied, trying to sound efficient and slightly harried, the kind of person who hasn’t the time to stop for a chat. ‘You’ve mistaken me for someone else.’
‘We’ll see.’ He cleared his throat loudly and made as if to wave to Hooper.
‘All right,’ I said quickly, hating the words as soon as they were out of my mouth. ‘I’ll listen to what you have to say.’
‘Good.’ He raised his hand as if about to clap me on the shoulder, but then lowered it again. ‘Come with me.’
It was late March, and seagulls were crying over the rooftops, gathering in flocks ready to head back to the coast. I looked longingly at the back gate. If I simply marched out, what could he do? I answered my own question: he could tell the police about me. And even if he didn’t, I would always fear that he might.
I followed him through one of the doors into a small kitchen, where two women were rocking babies, onwards along a corridor piled with open sacks of old clothes and rags, and into an empty hall where dozens of chairs had been arranged in rows. The sound of our shoes echoed off the walls.
It was clear that this building was much larger than I had supposed. I was acutely aware that I was accompanying a man I hadn’t seen in many years, and that he might be involved in a murder. I looked back the way we’d come, our damp footprints chasing us across the woodblock floor, and tried to remember the route we’d taken.
He led me up a flight of stairs to a narrow landing, ducking under a low lintel, his hands behind his back as if he was strolling through a museum. Finally, he stopped next to a door cut down diagonally to fit beneath the gable.
‘Mind your head.’
I followed him inside and went to close the door, but he put his hand on it.
‘No, please,’ he said, his face flushing. ‘I prefer it open.’
The room had a writing desk under the window, a tray of unwashed teacups, two club chairs and walls lined with bookshelves. I suffered a pang of jealousy, picturing myself having a study like this one, spending my days reading and practising chess openings. More books were piled on the floor and desk, with titles like Progress and Poverty and Principles of Political Economy. Not what I would have chosen.
Thackery perched on the edge of his desk while I stood. I didn’t want him to think I was staying.
‘It’s Leo now, isn’t it?’ he said.
‘Mr Stanhope,’ I replied, sounding pompous even to myself.
He studied my face, cocking his head to one side, his eyes straying downwards. I pulled my jacket tighter, but his expression was one of wonder rather than revulsion.
‘I wouldn’t have believed it,’ he said. ‘It’s quite remarkable.’
‘What is?’
I was keeping my voice calm and friendly even though I knew what he was thinking: that I could mimic masculinity quite well considering my limitations, rather as one might applaud a dog wearing a waistcoat. Bravo! It’s almost like the real thing.
He ignored my question. ‘You left so suddenly. Everyone was talking about it. I mean, it’s not something that can easily be explained away.’ I said nothing, and he sighed, still examining me, seeming most interested in the length of my shoes. He couldn’t know they were stuffed with newspaper. ‘We have many things to discuss, but first you must acknowledge that we know each other. I won’t speak further unless you do.’
I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. We were alone, and there was no point in denying the truth. And I needed to know what he intended.
‘Very well. We know each other. Now what of it?’
‘After you left, most people thought the obvious, I’m afraid.’
‘Which was?’
‘That you’d been sent away for reasons of impropriety … a young lady, you know, you wouldn’t be the first. My father even asked if we had … well, he thought perhaps you’d tempted me astray. I think he rather hoped you had, though he’s always convinced everyone is after his money.’ His face took on a sour expression. ‘Your father told everyone you’d gone away to France, but no one believed it. The reverend’s daughter, you know, it’s like a joke, isn’t it? And, if it was true, why did your mother stay in bed for a month afterwards? It didn’t hold water.’
I felt a lump rise in my throat. Before I had left home, I promised my mother I would write to her and had meant it at the time. But I never did. Much later, I discovered that she had pined for her youngest child, her jewel, every day for the rest of her life. The most difficult is always the favourite.
‘A few people thought you were dead,’ he continued. ‘There was a suggestion we should dig up the churchyard and open all the coffins.’
‘I don’t have time for your reminiscences.’
I turned towards the door and he put up his hands in surrender.
‘Please, sit down, Lott— Leo.’ I remained standing, holding my bowler in my hands. It was new and shiny, and droplets of water had beaded on the brim like gemstones. ‘There are things you need to know. We don’t have time for all of it, under the present circumstances.’ His voice caught, just a fraction. ‘But we should meet properly, and soon. There’s this thing called the greater good. Do you know what that means?’ He paused as if expecting me to answer, but I didn’t. He smiled thinly, acknowledging my silence as deliberate. ‘It means that sometimes we do things that seem wrong, but they lead to a better thing in the future.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘I’m saying that you really do need to help me with this. If you refuse, it will be the worse for you. I’ll tell everyone who and what you are. If I must be exposed, so will you be.’
He seemed entirely serious, and yet I still found it hard to accept that he was blatantly threatening me. What had I done to make him hate me so? All the care I took, day after day: the trials of finding the right clothes, the endless washing and drying of sanitary cloths, the salving of my bleeding sores where my binding chafed my skin, and most of all, the constant alertness to my voice, my stance, the way I used my hands and the exact blitheness of my laugh, much of which had been modelled on him; after all that, he would betray me? If it wasn’t so tragic it would be funny.
I took a deep breath. ‘What exactly do you want?’
‘You must tell the police we were together all of yesterday, including the evening.’
‘But we weren’t.’
‘I know, but I want you to say that we were. Not here, somewhere else.’ He scratched his head, thinking. ‘Say we went to Alexandra Park. There’s a horse show on, and the two of us spent the day there and had a friendly drink afterwards.’
‘I’ve already told the police the truth.’
He gave me a condescending smile. ‘Yes, but the memory plays tricks, doesn’t it, especially when you’re under stress. Seeing a dead body like that, it’s easy to get confused about dates and times and so forth. Tell them we were together, and I’ll do likewise, so our story is the same.’
He was behaving as if we were close friends concocting an excuse for a drunken night out, but we were virtually strangers, and Dora Hannigan had been buried just a few yards from this little room.
‘I won’t lie for you to cover up a murder.’
‘What?’ He looked genuinely shocked. ‘No, of course not. Good Lord, I had thought … I mean, you can’t possibly think I would do a thing like that, let alone …’ Again, his voice caught, and he had to pause, swallowing hard ‘… let alone to Dora.’
I frowned, not understanding. ‘Then why do you want me to lie?’
Despite having insisted we needed to hurry, he seemed content to take his time, sliding his finger around the top of a teacup as if he were trying to make it sing. I wondered if he washed up his own dirty crockery, or if he was waiting for a maid to come and do it for him.
‘The things my father cares about, they don’t interest me. Did you know he was knighted last year? He’s Sir Reginald Thackery now, never mind that he made every penny of his fortune exploiting the men who work for him in conditions you wouldn’t credit, while he’s never so much as pulled a jute stalk in his life. The new mill’s not like the one you remember. That was almost pleasant by comparison. This one’s in Whitechapel, and it’s vast and black, groaning all day and night. It’s like being in hell.’ He was staring straight ahead, and I had the feeling he wasn’t properly with me at all, but was reliving the memory of standing in that factory, consumed by the ghastliness of it. ‘With the fumes and dust, you can hardly see a thing. And the noise! An hour in that place and you can’t hear your own voice afterwards. And yet men spend their whole lives there.’
‘What does any of this have to do with me?’
He looked at me with something close to amazement. ‘It has to do with everyone! That’s what we’re trying to do, transform our economy. Our society. Henry Hyndman has spoken here, and Johann Most.’ He produced a pamphlet from the shelf, presumably by this Johann Most fellow, and started waving it at me. ‘They are remarkable men. They say that all property is truly theft because it’s been taken from the people by the rich, and the workers will rise up to reclaim what’s theirs.’
‘I doubt it would appeal to me.’
I had no interest in who was in government. Both sides would despise me equally.
He closed his eyes and seemed to be mumbling to himself, like a child trying to memorise a poem. ‘I’m sorry, I’ve strayed from my point, but I feel so strongly that justice needs to be served. It was my father who killed Dora. He murdered her as certainly as if he’d come here himself, although of course he wouldn’t. Even the task of killing can be loaded on to the backs of other men.’
Despite myself, I was curious. ‘What makes you think it was him?’
Thackery wiped his eyes and took a moment to control his breathing. ‘Dora used to work for the family, years ago, before we moved to Enfield. She had good cause to hate him, believe me.’
Sir Reginald wouldn’t be the first gentleman to force himself on a servant, I thought. But that would have to be at least twelve years ago. It didn’t seem a likely motive for murder now.
On the other hand, it wasn’t completely implausible either. Taken in the purely physical, Sir Reginald had been ordinary, of average height and build, losing his hair, not particularly striking in any way. And yet he exuded a sort of confidence, such as I’d never encountered before or since, as though everything he did or said was somehow correct, and even when he expressed an opinion as a mere passing remark, it was something you should listen to and act upon. His certitude was almost tangible. I could still picture him standing in the church after one of my father’s services, greeting his fellow parishioners as if he was a visiting dignitary doing them the honour of a handshake.
Yes, I thought. He might be capable of ordering a murder.
‘The police think some fellow named Duport is involved,’ I said. ‘That’s who they said they wanted to speak to next.’
‘Ah, is that so? They mentioned Duport specifically, did they?’
‘Yes. Could he have been acting on your father’s orders?’
Thackery went red and picked another volume off the shelf, flipping through the pages. ‘I say, do you remember that bookshop in Enfield, on the London Road? Did you ever go in there?’
‘I suppose so.’
I was shivering and annoyed. Of course I’d been in there; it was the only bookshop in the town, and I’d known every nook and cranny of it. Mr Heffernan had treated me like his own granddaughter. He used to save me slices of cake.
‘I went in a few times. The old man had a fancy for Chartism. Do you know what that is?’
‘Politics.’
A look of impatience crossed his face. ‘It was a movement. It meant treating all men fairly, paying decent wages and providing humane working conditions. The old man had dozens of books about it.’ He sighed at the memory. ‘I don’t suppose he sold many of them in Enfield, all things considered, except to me. I started with Carlyle’s The French Revolution.’ He held up the book to show me the title on the spine. ‘Not this actual copy. It was the first volume, and this is the second.’
‘Is there a point to this story?’
He gave me another impatient look. He really didn’t understand why everyone wasn’t fascinated by the same things as him. ‘I took it straight to the park and sat reading for hours. Such ideas Carlyle had! Such acuity! I’d never read anything like it. I was transfixed.’
‘Good for you, but I haven’t got time for this.’
I put on my hat and stood up. Thackery stood also, placing the volume on his desk and resting his hand on it, as if swearing on a Bible.
‘You should stay. There are things you need to know.’
‘I’ve heard enough.’
As I was leaving, he called after me: ‘Remember, you were with me all of yesterday at the horse show. If you don’t say that, I will tell the police about you. I have proof, if I need it, of who you truly are.’
I stormed down the corridor, intending to put as much distance between myself and John Thackery as I could.
If he did as he was threatening, every friend and acquaintance I had would shun me. Even Jacob, who knew exactly what I was, would have to deny it to avoid incriminating himself.
I would be convicted, perhaps for sexual offences and certainly for fraud. I held a position at the hospital as a man, not to mention my lodging with Alfie. The police would say I had claimed to be someone I was not. I would be imprisoned as Lottie Pritchard in a women’s prison and they would try to cure me. They would administer chemicals to douse my senses and, if those failed, run electricity through my head. But even that wasn’t the worst. On those nights when I awoke sweating and gripping the blankets, my throat hoarse, it was another dread that crawled through my guts and reached its fingers into my throat: cauterisation.
I had heard of doctors burning away the location, the very nub, of sexual pleasure, such that nothing was left, and a woman lusting after other women, as the doctors would believe me to be, would have that urge removed for ever. It was supposed to relieve wicked thoughts and allow the insanity to fade, but how was that possible? How could the doctor know, as he sets fire to another person’s skin, that it is the insanity which dissipates and not something else, something more precious? What if what’s lost is the self, that indefinable thing that makes us who we are?
What would be left behind if my self was burned away?
The thought of it almost made me sick.
I stopped. I had lost my bearings and was in an unfamiliar room containing what looked like a small printing press. I turned and went out through a different door, this time into a hallway leading to a dormitory filled with empty beds. An old woman was standing at the window and she started, crossing her arms over her chest.
‘It’s all right,’ I assured her. ‘How do I get out of here?’
She shook her head and started babbling in a language I didn’t understand, and then threw up her hands and said what appeared to be the only English word she knew: ‘Italian.’
‘Oh, I see. Excuse me.’
I went to the window, trying to orientate myself. I was looking down on the courtyard, where Dora Hannigan’s body was being carried away on a stretcher by two policemen. Hooper was holding a wad of paper under a lamp and flicking through it, appearing to get more and more furious as he turned the pages. When he’d finished, he shouted, ‘Search every room. The whole place.’
He looked up at the window, and I thought perhaps he’d caught sight of me. I stepped back into the shadows, and hurried out, finding my way through a succession of corridors to the stairs, where I almost careered into Pallett.
‘Good grief,’ I said to him. ‘This place is impossible!’
He nodded solemnly. ‘It’s a rabbit warren and no mistake.’
‘I thought this was a club of some kind. Why are all these people living in it?’
‘They’re radicals, sir.’
He seemed to think that was explanation enough.
In the courtyard, bats were making patterns in the lamplight above us, snatching insects out of the air. To my horror John Thackery was talking to Hooper. He pointed in my direction. ‘Of course, Detective Inspector,’ I heard him say. ‘I was with Mr Stanhope all day, at the horse show in Alexandra Park, and then we went to the pub. We were there until late, weren’t we, Leo?’
‘Is that right, Mr Stanhope?’ asked Hooper.
I stood with my mouth open for what felt like an eternity. ‘I … which day?’
‘Yesterday. Were you at the horse show or not?’
I nodded, not properly aware I was doing it.
Hooper pulled out his pen and notebook. ‘Didn’t you say before you were with your landlord drinking whisky?’
‘Um … yes, no, I misspoke. That was the day before. I’m sorry.’
He made a note, glancing at Thackery and me in turn.
‘If you’re not telling the truth, I’ll find out,’ he said. ‘I’m going to check every detail. I’ve sent for more men already. This case has become our highest priority.’
‘Why? Was Miss Hannigan someone important?’
Murders were commonplace in the city. I didn’t understand why the police would give this one special attention.
Hooper stepped towards me, seeming even taller. I could see up his nose. ‘You mind your own business. I’ll be seeing you both again.’ He tipped his hat to me and Thackery in turn. ‘Mr Stanhope. Mr Duport.’
Mr Duport?
Once Hooper had gone, I wheeled round and glared at Thackery. ‘You’re Mr Duport? You’re the man the police suspect is the murderer?’
‘Well, yes, that’s true. But I didn’t do it.’
I thumped the wall with my fist. ‘Why didn’t you tell me? And why are you using a false name?’
‘I tried to explain before, but you rushed out. That book I bought in Enfield, by Thomas Carlyle. When I got home, my father threw it away. He told me I must never look at such seditious nonsense again and wrote a letter to the mayor suggesting that the bookshop should be closed down. He thought the owner had known who I was and had pushed the book upon me as a way of making a point. But he was wrong; the old fellow had no idea. The next time I went in I called myself by a different name: John Duport. When I came here a couple of years ago, I didn’t want everyone knowing who I was related to, and I remembered the name. So, you see, we’re not so different, you and me. We both chose to be someone new.’
I stared at him, not believing what I was hearing. I had mentioned the name Duport to him and he hadn’t admitted it was his own alias. He had deceived me, straight to my face.
He produced a pocket watch from his waistcoat. ‘Stick to our story and we’ll both be fine. Look, it’s getting late and I have to go, but we must talk properly, and soon.’
‘I want nothing more to do with you,’ I said. ‘Nothing at all. Ever.’
I emphasised the last word by slicing the air between us with my hand. He didn’t notice or, if he did, he didn’t care.
‘There are things I need to tell you. Very important things. We need to talk like civilised … well, men. Come to the Marquis of Granby pub on South Audley Street. Do you know it? Good, I can see that you do. Tomorrow at seven-thirty.’
And with that, he scurried away towards the house, leaving me alone but for the bats and one young constable, who was walking around the courtyard unhooking the lamps.
When he reached the last one, he paused. ‘Are you all right, sir?’
I nodded, and he snuffed it out, leaving me in near darkness.
I had lied to the police about a murder. And I had given an alibi to their top suspect.