It is moonlight tonight. A clear, cold night full of sharp shadows, and the restless silence of a city that never fully comes to rest. In the attic at Buckingham Street a large black cat sleeps unchallenged and undisturbed on a tangled expanse of pale sheet, and in a room downstairs an old man stirs before the fire, his brow pressed into frowns, his mind astray in a thicket of memories that mingle and separate and re-combine in strange new patterns that he will not remember when he wakes.
Across town, in that immense but dreary mansion in its dull but elegant street, my Lady Dedlock’s soul is troubled, and she is heartsick. The spectre of her pursuer fills her mind, and the prospect of that pursuit, and of never being free of it, casts a shroud before her eyes. And not a mile away from her, in a small room, and a small street, another woman she once employed nurtures the like dark thoughts of the like implacable man, and festers a bitter hatred that she cares not to contain.
And then, suddenly and without warning, the air splits open with a hissing crack that sets the dogs barking for a mile around. Those few people still out of doors stop in their tracks and look up into the sky, but it is clear, and threatens no thunder. A firecracker? But no, Guy Fawkes is long gone, and the street-urchins sleeping. A window opens, then another. A man looks out, and calls down to those on the street. What made that noise – do any of them know? A sprat-seller who’s passing claims it came from over yonder near the Fields, but his voice is drowned in the sudden chiming of the hour, and by the time the last bell has faded, the street is silent again, and the moment, or incident, or whatever it was, has passed.
The morning finds Charles, once again, at the shooting gallery. Where he has been all night he does not say, but his lined shirt and shadowed jaw have their own tale to tell. As, perhaps, does the deep line that has now settled between his brows. What it is that has made him so angry – so angry that the air about him seems to crackle with furious energy – will become clear soon enough. For the moment, though, we will content ourselves with watching. And we will not be alone.
He has come, it seems, to the funeral of the crossing-sweep, though that is rather a grand term for such a meagre affair. The half-starved body lies in its open coffin, and though there are cuts on the bare feet and sores about the mouth, the thin face is finally – and perhaps for the first time – at peace. Jo has found his rest at last. The trooper has done what he can to dress the lad in clean clothes, and a heap of half-rotten verminous rags are now being fed into the rusty grate by an unusually grave-faced Phil. Charles stands with the doctor as the stern and ponderous beadle has the lid screwed down, and the coffin lifted on to the cart and wheeled towards the door. Their destination is the cemetery where Jo’s dead friend was laid, and though it’s scarcely possible to think of a worse horror than an eternity in such a place, the lad seemed to gain comfort at the end from the thought that he would lie close by the only person who had ever showed him a little human kindness.
Leaving Phil to attend to the morning clientele, the others take their places behind the cart as it creaks its way along the long whitewashed passage, followed slowly by its small cortège. There may only be three of them, but that’s more than Jo’s wildest dreams would ever have pictured, and certain it is that he is more lavishly attended now than he ever was in his short and disregarded life. It’s only when the cart swings out into the road that Charles seems to realize, with a start, that the procession now numbers four. They did not see him come, they did not hear his tread, but he walks there beside them all the same. Stout and sombre in his unexceptionable black suit, there seems at first glance nothing noteworthy about him at all. Nothing, perhaps, aside from the rather odd way he has suddenly materialized, and a certain glint in his eye as he contemplates Charles.
Two of the three mourners are clearly well aware of the identity of their new companion, but while the trooper’s face merely sets yet grimmer and more silent, the very sight of this apparently inoffensive little man seems to douse hot oil on Charles’ dry fury.
‘What in God’s name are you doing here?’ he says, gripping the man by the sleeve and swinging him round to face him. ‘Haven’t you done enough harm to that miserable little wretch without turning up here now to gloat over your handiwork?’
‘Now, Charles, my lad,’ says Mr Bucket, taking his hand from his arm, ‘that’s hardly the way to speak to an old friend, now is it? And all may not be as you currently believe it is, in respect of the boy.’
‘He’d done nothing to you. He’d committed no crime.’
‘There was nothing charged against him,’ replies Bucket, rubbing his face with his forefinger, ‘but that is not to say he was innocent neither. No – I tracked the boy down because I wished to keep a certain matter quiet that risked being made public in a very unpleasant manner, and bringing all kinds of trouble on the heads of his betters. He’d been more loose-tongued than he should have been about a service he’d been paid for, and that sort of thing won’t do at all.’
‘Not, at least, when the man paying for that service is Edward Tulkinghorn,’ Charles retorts sardonically.
Bucket looks at him with his habitual attentiveness. ‘That’s as may be. Rather more to the present purpose, I gather you have had dealings of your own with that gentleman of late. Dealings that you have also, in your turn, been paid for. And handsomely too, or so I hear.’
Charles steps closer, his eyes darkening. ‘I’m going to find out the truth of this, Bucket. And then where will you be, you and your loathsome masters? However much Tulkinghorn’s paying you on the side, it won’t be enough. Not nearly enough – not when I’ve finished with you.’
‘Ah, there’s no call for that now, is there,’ says Bucket brightly, taking him by the elbow. ‘I will come along with you for a moment, if you’ve no objection.’
‘In fact I have a very strong objection indeed to spending a single minute more in your society. You have no business here and none, as far as I know, with me.’
He turns to go, but Bucket still has his hand on his arm. ‘Half a minute, Charles. I should wish to speak to you first.’
He stops, looks about him, then claps Charles suddenly against the wall of the alley. The cart is by now at least fifty yards ahead and the doctor turns and hesitates for a moment, not knowing whether to intervene. But it is only for a moment; he must have decided that Charles has some business with the newcomer, and is more than capable of looking after himself.
‘Now, Charles,’ says Bucket softly, as the coffin and its followers disappear at the end of the street. ‘You know, and I know, that your great-uncle was a friend of mine once – friend and mentor – and I don’t want this little matter to get in the way of that, not if I can help it. I will endeavour to make things as pleasant as they may be, but you must be under no misapprehension. You are in my custody now, my lad, and you know what that means, none better.’
‘Custody?’ scoffs Charles. ‘What the devil for?’
‘Now, now,’ says Mr Bucket, reinforcing his words with his insistent forefinger. ‘As you know very well, I am under an obligation to inform you that anything you might say will be liable to be used against you. Therefore, I advise you to be rather careful what you do say. You may drop the pretence now, there’s a good lad. We both know I have come about the murder.’
‘You can’t intimidate me that easily,’ says Charles, pushing Bucket’s hand away. ‘You know as well as I do that I didn’t kill Lizzie Miller. I have an alibi. Which I’ve been through already – and in detail – with Wheeler—’
‘Now, now,’ interrupts Bucket, tapping his forefinger – perhaps unadvisedly – on Charles’ chest. ‘Think carefully, mind, before you speak again. There has been a murder. Last night. In Lincoln’s Inn Fields. Shot, he was, right through the heart, clean as you like. You know who I mean, and I know you know. And now you understand what I’m doing here, don’t you?’
Charles stares at him, then puts both hands on Bucket’s shoulders and shoves him, none too gently, away. ‘I was nowhere near there last night. I reviled and despised Tulkinghorn, yes, but I didn’t kill him. Though I’d like to shake the hand of the man who did. You’ll have to try harder than that, Bucket. You can’t pin this one on me.’
‘Now, Charles,’ returns Mr Bucket, seemingly unperturbed, ‘you know full well that I can. This murder I speak of was done at around ten o’clock. If what you’re telling me is true, a bright lad like you will know where he was at that particular time, and will be able to prove it.’
‘No,’ says Charles quietly. All his stridency has suddenly evaporated and his face is white. ‘I cannot prove it. I was – it doesn’t matter where I was – but it wasn’t Lincoln’s Inn Fields, or anywhere within a mile of that accursed house. You have my word.’
‘Well, I’m sure you’ll understand that I don’t have a mind to accept your word, on this occasion,’ says Mr Bucket with a smile. ‘After all, as you will recall from your own days in the Detective, when a certain person has been seen more than once at the scene of the crime, when that person has, indeed, been heard arguing with the victim – even, perhaps, threatening him – a threat witnessed by a most unimpeachable source – then it’s in the natural way of things that I should seek out that person and bring him in for questioning. So, young Charles, am I to call in assistance, or is the deed done?’
Charles stares at him for a long moment, as if weighing his options. And he must have concluded he has very few, because a moment later he nods slowly. ‘There’s no need for that. If I have to come, I’ll do so quietly.’
‘All the same,’ says Bucket affably, ‘this is a very serious charge, Charles, and I have a preference to do such things by the book.’
He takes a pair of cuffs from his pocket and stands, holding them, waiting. Charles starts back angrily but says nothing, and eventually holds out his hands in silence.
Mr Bucket busies himself in one or two small adjustments, then stands back. ‘There, how is that? Will they do? If not, I have another pair about me that are just as serviceable.’
Charles shakes his head. ‘For God’s sake, get on with it. Let’s get this over with.’
*
It is, mercifully for all concerned, a very short way to Bow Street, so it is barely half an hour later that Charles finds himself in an underground cell, the iron-bound door of which he knows only too well, even if this is the first time he has seen it from the inside. But it is long, very long, before Bucket elects to visit his prisoner, and when the door is unbolted, he finds Charles pacing up and down, striking his fists against the rough brick walls, his coat cast on the bench. Although the cell is freezing his shirt is damp and there are unsightly patches of sweat under the arms. If it’s true that it’s the innocent who rage against wrongful arrest while the guilty go quietly to sleep, then there is surely no more blameless man in London than the man in this cell. And even if the latter is a very modern insight, Inspector Bucket is a very insightful man, and well able to draw his own conclusions. Not that he seems mindful to share them. Now, or at any other time.
‘Now, young Charles,’ he begins, taking a seat as if he were in his own sitting-room, and the bench as comfortable as his favourite armchair. ‘I hope this little interlude has given you some time to think, and consider your position. For it’s not a good one, all things taken into account. It’s a bad look-out for you at present, and no mistake.’
Charles, who remains standing, looks down at him without any attempt to conceal his distaste.
‘Point one,’ continues Bucket, telling them off with his fat forefinger. ‘You was heard, only a few days ago, by the deceased’s clerk, threatening his life – and in rather lurid tones, I may add. Point two, as the whole station-house here knows, you have a gun, and are competent to use it. Point three, you cannot – or will not – furnish an alibi for the time of the crime. So, young Maddox, can you give me one good reason why I should not be a-charging you with this murder right here and now, and having you taken down to Newgate without delay?’
Before Charles can answer, there’s a noise in the passage outside, and Sam Wheeler’s carroty head appears round the corner.
‘Just to say they’ve brought ’im in. The deceased, sir. ’E’s in the back room upstairs.’
Bucket betrays no irritation at the interruption – if indeed he feels any – but merely nods and goes out, calling to the guard to come and lock the door, and leaving Charles and Wheeler alone together. It’s only to be expected that Charles should beg a word with his friend, but neither of them have any idea that they are not the only ones to take part in the conversation that follows, even if the third party is more by way of an eavesdropper than a participant in the full sense of the term. But Inspector Bucket is nothing if not patient, and he is quite content to sit quiet and unmoving in the darkened cell next door, listening intently and waiting for his moment in his own comfortable manner. He has built his career on that way he has, and his reputation on ruses such as this, and he is rarely if ever disappointed. When Wheeler leaves a few moments later and he hears the bolts slide to, Bucket glides from his hiding-place without making a sound – he is surprisingly light on his feet for such a solid little man. And having let you into this particular secret, you will guess at the next one easily enough. He has a shorter wait this time, having had the foresight to allow the prison guard an early luncheon, and to have made a certain amount of fuss at the front desk about a carriage he requires for an urgent call he has to make on an eminent member of the baronetage. And so it is that the station-house falls unusually quiet for the time of day, and Bucket has only to wait in stillness in the closet next to the room where they have laid – rather unceremoniously, it must be said – all that now remains of a man who once stood at the shoulder of half the peerage in the land. Once in a while he takes his fat forefinger and pushes the closet door an inch open, then lets it fall softly to. It has been much in evidence of late, that finger. When he is on the trail of a crime, this finger of Bucket’s will be seen placed close to his ear, or held in the air, or rubbed along his nose; but as every one of his subordinates knows, it never fails, be it soon or late, to finally point out the guilty man. But here, for the moment, it performs only the function that God – or evolution – intended.
And pat they come. Wheeler flushed, fidgety, transparently a guilty thing surprised; Charles pale, slightly hectic still about the eyes, but from the way he starts to examine the corpse, his presence of mind has not yet abandoned him. Bucket observes him for a few moments and sighs silently to himself. He has few regrets of a professional nature, but this young man is one of them. And there is something preoccupying Charles now – something that seems to be almost literally eating away at him, that Bucket would dearly love to fathom. His forefinger twitches in sympathy, as if itching to prod and probe this little mystery and make all plain. He watches as Charles circles the table and comes to a halt by the old man’s head, where the sheet is pulled tight to the drooping chin. Even in life Tulkinghorn was a parched thing, a thing of sallow paper and old desiccated confidences, but in death he seems to have shrunk back inside his own bones. The blotched and withered skin sags from his skull and the old hair clings in scraps to the wrinkled scalp. From dust we come, and to dust we return, but in Tulkinghorn’s case the process seems to be starting long before he is committed to the ground. Bucket knows well enough what lies beneath that all-concealing sheet, and Charles must surely guess, but all the same the young man takes a deep breath before he takes hold of it and pulls it back. It seems the lawyer is a lawyer yet, clad still in his time-honoured suit of black, his lustreless knee-breeches tied with ribbons, and his wilted white stock. But this impeccable palette of monochrome tones glares now with colour – colour almost scandalous in its gaudy flamboyance, its ostentatious indifference to all those qualities of silence and reserve and anonymity the old man once stood for. It’s doubtful anyone ever saw Tulkinghorn, night or day, with his coat unbuttoned, but this particular indignity is only the first of many his dead flesh must now bear. The fine lawn shirt is soaked with a deep red taint that spreads from neck to gut, but the red is rawest, and the stain is densest, and the bloody cloth is bloodiest, around a small tight black hole in the centre of his chest, hard by the heart few of those who had dealings with him ever believed he possessed. Charles stands there a moment unmoving, and Bucket nods unseen, as if reading his thoughts. Who, indeed, would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him? But a minute later he hears Wheeler hiss at his companion from the doorway, ‘Come on, Chas – we ain’t got all day.’ He’s so nervous he can barely keep still, and keeps darting his head into the corridor, then back again into the room. ‘’Ave you got what you came for, because if you ’ave, let’s get out of ’ere, and quick.’
‘I was right,’ says Charles slowly. ‘See this bullet wound? It’s far too small to have been made with a bullet from my pistol.’
He looks again at the corpse. ‘In fact, I think the shot was fired from only a foot or so away. That means Tulkinghorn knew his killer, and trusted him. Or at the very least saw no threat in having him at such close quarters. Which is precisely the opposite of what Bucket is alleging where I’m concerned. If he’s going to rely on my supposed threats to make his case stick, how does he explain the old man allowing me to get so close?’
Wheeler edges nearer, interested despite himself. ‘But if it were close range there’d be powder marks and you’ve got next to no chance findin’ ’em. That moth-eaten old rag’s too dark to show anythin’.’
Charles turns the coat against the light and is forced to agree. But as Bucket already suspects, he’s the last and very possibly the best pupil his great-uncle ever had. A moment later Bucket sees him dip his head against the body and breathe deeply. A gesture, incidentally, that you would have seen Bucket himself performing no more than an hour ago, when the body was first brought in. Which means he knows exactly what conclusion the young man is drawing: overlaid on the dankness of old clothes and the sweet metallic aroma of new blood, there is the faint but unmistakable smell of burnt gunpowder. When Charles straightens up, there is a hard little smile on his face, but the smile dies when he lifts his eyes and sees who else is now in the room.
‘Well done, young Maddox,’ says Mr Bucket genially. ‘You’re a quick study, that’s what you are, and no mistake. And so you think you’ve found the answer, do you? And I suppose, moreover, that you’ll soon be a-persuading me that this is the answer, and expecting me to unlock these doors and put away my cuffs, and escort you with all due courtesy to the front door? Of course you do,’ he continues conversationally, ‘and very odd indeed it would be if you didn’t.’
‘Don’t blame Sam,’ says Charles quickly. ‘It’s my fault. I persuaded him to let me in.’
‘Oh I know all about that,’ says Bucket, tapping his nose with his busy forefinger. ‘And you do right by him, so you do, for taking the blame. Now don’t you be a-fretting,’ he says, throwing a glance in Wheeler’s direction. ‘I know what’s what, and who’s who, and loyalty’s a quality I prize a good deal even when it’s misplaced. As it looks to be in this case. Well then, I’ll tell you something, young Wheeler. I think you’d be best, all things taken into account, to take yourself back down to the desk and wait for me there. I’ll be wanting a word with you in due course, but I have one or two for Mr Maddox here first.’
Wheeler shoots an agonized look in Charles’ direction – which the latter does not see – then stumbles out of the room. Bucket hears his feet in the stone passage, first walking, then quickening to a run.
‘Now then,’ he resumes, ‘I heard what you were a-saying about the deceased, and I am obliged to say that I am minded to agree with you.’
‘Then you’ll let me go—’
Mr Bucket’s finger is raised in the air.
‘But if it wasn’t my gun—’
‘Don’t you be jumping to conclusions,’ says Mr Bucket, ‘and you’ll find it goes much better for you. Now,’ he says, ‘I’m sure you realize, being such a quick study, that it would be as easy as winking for you to have borrowed another gun. That you might a-done so precisely for that reason – to lay me off the trail.’
‘Where could I have found one like it? This gun can’t have been much larger than a pocket pistol – I don’t think I’ve ever even seen one, much less fired one.’
‘Ah, but you would know someone who has, I think?’ replies Mr Bucket affably. ‘You do, after all, frequent a well-known shooting gallery, where all types of tastes are catered for, and all types of firearms are readily to be had. Indeed I’ll bet a pound that if I were to rummage about a bit in the said establishment, I might find any number of the like weapons, and recently discharged to boot.’
‘On the contrary—’ begins Charles, before faltering. It seems he was about to come to the trooper’s stout defence, but something is suddenly holding him back. Something, muses Bucket, like a case of little pearl-handled guns, kept neatly in a drawer. But he says nothing of this, and merely watches Charles with his most watchful eyes and smiles his most knowing smile.
‘As it happens,’ the inspector resumes presently, as if for all the world there had been no interruption at all, ‘I am inclined to believe you on this occasion. Which is lucky for you. Even luckier, I should say, is the fact that certain new information has come into my possession, which diminishes the suspicions I had entertained of you and raises them in regard to another party. That being the case, I am willing to discharge you, for the present, on your own recognizance. But with certain conditions. That does not surprise you, I am sure.’
‘And they are?’ asks Charles evenly.
‘First, that you keep away from that shooting gallery and have no intercourse – written or otherwise – with the trooper who runs it.’
The young man gives little away at this, beyond the slightest of flickers behind the eyes. He’s a cool customer, thinks Bucket, and that’s a fact.
‘And if I refuse?’
‘Oh, you won’t do that, I’ll wager,’ replies Bucket complacently. ‘You’re a clever young man, and a sensible one on the whole, and your business is a business that requires a reputation for trustworthiness and an unsullied record. I’m sure it ain’t necessary to say to a man like you that it’s the best and wisest way that this little matter of your arrest should not come to your clients’ ears.’
Charles’ face is set; he knows, and Bucket knows, that he has him there.
Bucket smiles. ‘In a case such as this one, all is not always what it seems. In my experience, and I dare say in yours, things are apt to come to light, and secrets laid bare, that in other circumstances would no doubt have lain long dead and buried. I say it again, and you would do well to heed my words: all is not always what it seems, even to those most closely involved.’
He regards Charles with a thoughtful eye. ‘I am asking you, lad, as a present member of the Detective to a former one, to trust me. I am sure you see me, just at present, as your opponent. Your enemy, even. You know a little of my dealings with Mr Tulkinghorn, and you have extrapolated that little into a very great deal indeed. Moreover, you have picked up other bits and pieces here and there, and have fitted them likewise into the same great puzzle. I can see how this has occurred. I might even – in your place – have made the like error. But it is an error, Charles. I hope it will not be long before you see that. I can say no more than this for the present, but you have heard me say often enough, to the victims in like unhappy affairs, that I will not turn out of my way, right or left, or take a sleep, or a wash, or a shave,’ this with a rather pertinent glance at Charles, ‘till I have found what I go in search of. And when that day comes, you may discover that we are, in fact, working the same case – albeit from opposite ends.’
‘And you ask me to believe that – to take it on trust? On your word merely?’
‘Dear me, no,’ says Bucket, ‘not on that alone. On your knowledge of me, and my methods, and the fact that I learned those methods from a master of our art. Now you know who I mean, and I know you know, so we need say no more on that.’
They stand, eyes locked, for perhaps a minute, then Charles shakes his head. ‘I’m sure you’ll understand,’ he says drily, mocking the detective’s words, ‘that I don’t have much of a mind to accept your word, on this occasion. I will keep away from the gallery, but that is as much as I am prepared to pledge.’
Bucket nods slowly. ‘And you still refuse to tell me where you were last evening?’
Charles shakes his head. The livid anger has returned to his face. ‘At ten o’clock last night I was with a woman – though not in the way you probably think. She was helping me. But as I’m sure you are only too well aware, anyone who offers to help me these days has a more than passing chance of turning up dead very soon after. I don’t want any more needless deaths on my conscience, and I’m certainly not going to be responsible for handing you another victim – you or Sir Julius Cremorne.’
If that name means anything to the inscrutable Bucket, then he makes no sign.
‘Very well,’ says the inspector eventually. ‘I will make arrangements to have you discharged. But I caution you this: you are making a mistake, my friend. A very grave mistake. I hope it does not cost you dear.’