The Meaning of Night Part 37

I am close behind him no more than six or seven feet. My years as Mr Tredgold's private agent have taught me how to track someone without their being at all aware of my presence, and I am confident that I am invisible to him. The lane is deserted. I reach into my pocket and pull out one of the pistols. A few steps more. My shoes are wrapped in rags so that my steps make no sound. He stops, just under the lamp, to light a cigar a perfectly illuminated target. Hidden in a doorway, I raise the pistol.

Why is my hand shaking? Why do I not pull the trigger? I take aim again, but by now he has moved out of the yellow arc of light and in a moment he has disappeared into the darkness.

I remain standing in the doorway, still trembling, for several minutes.

I had done many things in my life of which, G.o.d knows, I was ashamed; but I had never yet killed a man. I had mistakenly thought it would be easy; that my hate and rage would carry me through. My weakness appalled me; but I told myself that there is little in this world that may not be mastered with study and application; and murder is the least of challenges, if the injury be great enough and the will sufficient.

But could I really do such a deed? Might not my courage fail me when the moment came to strike the fatal blow? The mere act of mentally putting the question to myself engendered an almost imperceptible thrill of doubt. Surely I would not flinch a second time? There again: that momentary p.r.i.c.k of apprehension.

At last I saw what I must do.

I must make a trial of my resolve.

Monday, 23rd October, 1854.3 I awake shaking. For an hour I lay and listen to the wind and dream I am in my bed at Sandchurch once again. There are shadows on the wall that I cannot explain. A woman with [tusks?]. A king wielding a great scimitar. A terrible claw-like hand that creeps over the counterpane.

I reach for my bottle of Dalby's. This is the third time tonight.

In the morning, Mrs Grainger knocks at the door. I send her away. I am unwell, I tell her.

I will not go out today.

Tuesday, 24th October, 1854.

My bottle of Dalby's is empty. I begin to weep as I shake the last few remaining drops into my winegla.s.s.

It will be tonight. I walk down to the river and across Southwark Bridge to take my luncheon. I watch the waiter cutting a slice of [beef] from the platter. It is a fine sharp knife and [gleams?] in the firelight. It will do very well. Much better than a pistol.

And so to Messrs [Corbyn4 ] in High Holborn. 'A persistent headache, sir? Nothing more unpleasant. We recommend [G.o.dfrey's] Cordial. You prefer Dalby's? Certainly, sir.'

Five o'clock by the Temple Church. On with my great-coat. Stow the knife securely. Where are my old [gloves]?

I step outside. A sharp night, with fog coming down.

St Paul's rises into the murk. The [lantern] is invisible, and also the Golden Gallery where I stood with my dear girl a lifetime ago.

East down Cheapside and into Cornhill. The City churches ring out six o'clock. I have been wandering for an hour. Him? Or him? The fellow loitering outside St Mary-le-Bow? The old gentleman coming out of Ned's Chop-house in Finch-lane? I am bewildered. So many black coats, so many black hats. So many lives. How do I choose?

At length I find myself in Threadneedle-street, looking across to the entrance of the Bank of England. I cannot do this after all.

Then I see him, and my heart begins to thump. He is [dressed] the same as all the others, but something seems to distinguish him. He stands, looking about him. Will he cross the street? Perhaps he intends to take the omnibus that is now approaching. But then he pulls on his gloves and walks smartly off towards Poultry.

I keep him in sight as we walk westwards, back along Cheapside, past St Paul's, and down Ludgate Hill to Fleet-street and Temple Bar. Then he turns northwards a little way, up Wych-street and across to Maiden-lane, where he takes some refreshment at a coffee-house and reads the paper for half and hour. At a few minutes after seven o'clock, he leaves, stands for a few moments on the pavement in the [swirling] mist to adjust his m.u.f.fler, and then is on his way again.

A little further we go, and then into a narrow court that I have never noticed before. I stand at the entrance, taking in its high blank walls, its deep shadows. The court seems to close in round the solitary figure of my victim as he walks towards a short flight of steps leading down to the Strand. At the head of the steps is a fizzing gas-lamp that throws out a weak smudge of dirty yellow light into the foggy dark. Where is this? I look up.

'Cain-court, W.'

My hand is on the knife.

44:.

Vindex1 __________*

Le Grice stood up and pulled back the curtains. Sunlight streamed into the room. It is now November the thirteenth, 1854. The night had pa.s.sed away in talk, and by the time the new day had broken forth I had placed the true history of Edward Glyver before my old friend, sparing him only the despatching of Lucas Trendle, and my resolve to do the same to Phoebus Daunt.

'This is a tale, and no mistake, G.,' he said. 'But what I don't understand is why Daunt sent me that book to give to you. Wouldn't Miss Carteret have told him where he could find you?'

'I can only guess that he is playing some sort of game with me,' I replied. 'It is a warning perhaps against trying to get back at him, and to let me know that I am within his reach.'

'I say!' Le Grice had spun round, an excited look in his eye. 'The copies! You still have the copies, of the Deposition and what not, that you sent to old Tredgold.'

'Gone,' I said.

'Gone?'

'When I got back from Evenwood, after seeing her, there was a letter from Mr Tredgold. There'd been a burglary his sister and brother had taken him to the Cathedral and the house was empty. Nothing of value taken, only papers and doc.u.ments. They were no use anyway. All in my own hand, you see.'

Crestfallen, he threw himself back into his chair. But after a minute or two's silence he slapped the arm.

'Breakfast, I think. That's the thing we need.' So off we went to the London Tavern to take our fill of eggs, bacon, and oyster-toast, supplemented by liberal doses of coffee.

'There's no point beating around the bush, old boy,' said Le Grice as we walked out into the street. 'You're sunk. And that's all about it.'

'It would seem so,' I agreed gloomily. 'Mr Tredgold is much of the same mind.'

'And there's still our friend on the river. The jolly boatman. What I think is, he might be an a.s.sociate of Daunt's, perhaps, keeping an eye on you. Now what's to be done about him, I wonder?'

It is strange how a single word or phrase from another's lips can sometimes throw light on a truth we have been struggling unsuccessfully to uncover. Was there no end to my stupidity? An a.s.sociate of Daunt's. There was only one a.s.sociate of his that I knew of, and that was Josiah Pluckrose. The line of reasoning that succeeded this thought was swift and, to my mind, conclusive. If Pluckrose was the man in the boat, then Pluckrose might also be the man who had tapped me on the shoulder on leaving Abney Cemetery after the funeral of Lucas Trendle, and outside the Diorama following my walk with Bella in the Regent's Park. And then the leap. 'An end is come, the end is come: it watcheth for thee; behold, it is come'. I hear again in my head the admonitory verse from Ezekiel, to which I had been directed by a series of pin-p.r.i.c.ked holes on the first blackmail note. Blackmail? No: a warning, from my enemy. Jukes, I now see, had nothing to do with it, though the mystery of how he had come by the treasures I had seen in his room remained. The notes were the work of Daunt. He has set a watch on me, and the consequence is that he knows about Lucas Trendle. But why was he watching me? He has taken everything from me. Is he not satisfied? Does he want to take my life as well, to make his triumph certain?

'What ails thee, knight-at-arms?' I hear Le Grice say as he claps me heartily on the back. 'You look distinctly seedy, but then I'm not surprised. Mr Dark Horse indeed! But fret not. The pride of the Le Grices is by your side, come what may. No need to soldier on alone any more. There's still some time before I join my regiment, and it's yours, old boy, all yours. And then, perhaps you might go travelling till I return. What do you say?'

I took his hand and thanked him, from the bottom of my heart.

'What now?' he asked, cheroot clamped between his teeth.

'I'm to my bed,' I said.

'I'll walk with you.'

A letter arrives the next day from Mr Tredgold, full of sympathy for my situation and imploring me to come to Canterbury as soon as I can. But what can Mr Tredgold do? Without the evidence that has been taken from me, my claim to be Lord Tansor's son can never be pursued. And so I leave his letter on my work-table, unanswered.

Sitting in my chair by the fire, I begin to consider my neighbour, Fordyce Jukes. I had concluded, to my own satisfaction, that he had had no hand in what I had mistakenly thought was an attempt to blackmail me. But how could a nothing such as Jukes a mere clerk have acc.u.mulated the precious items I had seen displayed in his rooms, except through extortion or embezzlement, or plain theft?

I give up trying to solve the conundrum of Jukes and, to divert myself, I pick up the volume of poems Daunt had given to Le Grice at the United Services Club and start to read: 'Ode to Apollo'; 'Zenocrates' Garden'; 'The Sorrows of Odin'; 'Evenwood: A Sonnet' (at the puerility of which I laugh out loud); 'Sennarcherib: A Fragment'; 'The Song of the a.s.syrian Slave'. Such soaring imbecility! Such plangent vagueness! And then I come across some lines (spuriously 'translated from the Persian'):: The night has come upon me.

No more the breaking day, No more the noontide's glare, No more the evening's ray, Soft as lovers' sighs.

For Death is the meaning of night; The eternal shadow Into which all lives must fall, All hopes expire.

Amen to that! I copy the lines out on a piece of paper, which I place in my pocket-book, as a kind of talisman, and in sure antic.i.p.ation that they will soon memorialize the late Phoebus Rainsford Daunt. As I close the book, my eye rests again on the written inscription: 'To my friend, E.G., with fondest memories of old times, and hope of early reunion'. On a sudden impulse, I s.n.a.t.c.h up my magnifying-gla.s.s and examine the writing with the minutest care. Then I fetch the anonymous note that was sent to Bella and do the same. The hand that wrote the latter had been brilliantly disguised; but I had no doubt now that the author had been Phoebus Daunt.

The following evening, just before six o'clock, there is a knock on the door. It is Dorrie Grainger.

'Begging your pardon, sir, but a letter 'as come for you, care of Mr Gillory Piggott, my Geoffrey's employer.'

I had immediately seen that the envelope bore an Australian stamp, and so guessed who it might be from. Having thanked Dorrie and closed the door, I opened the envelope. Inside was another, which I also tore open.

SIR,- I direct this little note to you via my former neighbour Piggott, as I have reason to believe you are acquainted with his man, Martlema.s.s.

I regret that I did not feel it to be in my interests to help you bring evidence against a certain literary gent in respect of his past misdemeanours. But, believing that you may be set on giving my erstwhile colleagues what for, I am magnanimously sending you a piece of information I had forgotten but which may perhaps still be useful to you not in the least because I esteem you (far from it: I hope most earnestly that your carca.s.s may rot in unhallowed ground for a thousand years), but in the hope that it might a.s.sist you to deliver a hammering to D. and P., with my compliments, for old times' sake, from which (I hope) they may never rise. I suppose I could return and bring them both down, but things are going well out here gulls and fools just as plentiful in the Colonies as in the mother country, I'm glad to say. And so G.o.d speed to your enterprise, following which I hope the Devil will take you.

Here it is, then. The paid man our old Newmarket friends had put into Tredgolds for the cheques dodge, which you asked me about. I now remember his name can't think how I could have forgotten it. Jukes. A queer little pipkin. First name not known. I believe he continued to serve our mutual friend PRD in his various enterprises after the Tredgold dodge.

Yours, in happy exile, and fond memories of our brief acquaintance, L. PETTINGALE.

Bravo Pettingale, I murmur to myself. And so a little more light is shone into the darkness. I considered what an a.s.sociation between Daunt and Jukes might imply; but it was not until the following night that everything fell into place.

For two nights past, I had awoken from that most fearful dream of mine in which I find myself alone in the midst of a vast columned chamber in the depths of the earth, my flickering candle revealing nothing but Stygian darkness without end on every side; but then, as always, I realize with suffocating terror that I am not alone, as I had believed. Maddened with fear, I await the expected soft pressure on the shoulder and the little stream of warm breath caressing my cheek as it extinguishes the candle's flame. I could not face it a third time, and so I got up and tried to light the fire in my sitting-room, but it would not draw and soon puttered out. Wrapped in a blanket against the cold, I took up the third volume of the Bibliotheca Duportiana and sat before the dreary blank mouth of the fireplace.

I had reached the letter 'N': Nabbes's Microcosmus: A morall maske (1637); the works of Thomas Nashe; Pynson's Natura Brevium of 1494; Fridericus Nausea's Of all Blasing Starres in Generall, published in English by Woodc.o.c.ke in 1577; Netter's Sacramentalia (Paris, Francois Regnault, 1523) . . . I lingered for a moment over Dr Daunt's description of this rare work of doctrinal theology an exceptionally rare work; a most improbable work for a solicitor's clerk on eighty pounds a year to possess.

At eight o'clock the next morning I am standing at the top of the stairs, listening. At last I hear it: the sound of Fordyce Jukes's door closing behind him. Once at the bottom, I linger for a moment or two, smelling the cold damp air coming in from the street. The door is locked, as I expected, but I have come prepared, and am quite unconcerned by the damage I inflict.

The apartment is as I remembered it from my last uninvited visit: neat and comfortable, swept and polished, and containing an extraordinary number of fine and valuable objects. But only one of them interests me at present.

The lock of the cabinet presents no difficulty for my jemmy. I reach in and take out what I seek: Thomas Netter, Sacramentalia folio, Paris, Regnault, 1523. It bears the same bookplate as that of the first edition of Felltham's Resolves secreted by Miss Eames in Lady Tansor's burial chamber. There are a dozen or so other books of rare quality in the cabinet. They all bear the same plate. The books; the paintings and prints on the walls; the objets in the cabinets all of the first quality, all portable, and all undoubtedly stolen from Evenwood by Phoebus Daunt and stowed away here, in the rooms of his creature, Fordyce Jukes, until he should have need of them.

Back in my room, I compose a short letter, in capital letters and using my left hand: DEAR LORD TANSOR,.

I WISH TO BRING TO YOUR ATTENTION A MOST SERIOUS MATTER, CONCERNING A NUMBER OF VALUABLE ITEMS THAT I BELIEVE HAVE BEEN UNLAWFULLY REMOVED FROM YOUR COUNTRY RESIDENCE OVER THE COURSE OF THE PAST FEW YEARS. THE ITEMS IN QUESTION, WHICH INCLUDE SEVERAL BOOKS OF GREAT RARITY, MAY BE FOUND, QUITE OPEN TO VIEW, IN THE ROOMS OF F. JUKES, SOLICITOR'S CLERK, 1 TEMPLE-STREET, WHITEFRIARS, GROUND FLOOR.

I a.s.sURE YOU, MY LORD, THAT THIS INFORMATION IS PERFECTLY ACCURATE, AND THAT I HAVE NO OTHER MOTIVE IN SETTING IT BEFORE YOU THAN A SINCERE REGARD FOR YOUR POSITION AS THE PRESENT REPRESENTATIVE OF AN ANCIENT AND DISTINGUISHED FAMILY, AND AN EARNEST DESIRE TO SEE JUSTICE DONE.

I AM, SIR, YOUR VERY OBEDIENT SERVANT,.

'CHRYSAOR'2 So much for Fordyce Jukes.

Windmill-street, dusk.

The drabs, all rouged up for business, are beginning to swarm out of the surrounding courts and into the streets. I linger for a while in Ramsden's coffee-house, and then saunter along to the Three Spies.3 A dirty little gonoph4 tries to pick my pocket as I stand lighting my cigar, but I turn just in time and knock him down, to the general amus.e.m.e.nt of all aro Several of the drabs give me the eye, but there's nothing that takes my fancy. Then, as I'm about to move off, a girl comes out of the Three Spies carrying an umbrella. She looks up at the sky, and is preparing to walk past me when I stop her.

'Excuse me. Why, of course! Mabel, is it not?'

'She eyes me up and down.

'And who, may I ask, wants to know?' And then she smiles her recognition.

'Mr Glapthorn, I think. How do you do?' Delightfully, she gives me a kiss on the cheek. She smells of soap and eau de Cologne.

I reply that I am all the better for seeing her and ask after her employer, the enterprising Madame Mathilde, and also her sister Cissie, for I had a sudden strong hankering to reacquaint myself with these most accommodating soeurs de joie.

Cissie was in Gerrard-street, I am informed, and after some refreshment at the Opera Tavern, we repair thither through the rain. Up the stairs we go, to find Miss Cissie warming her pretty toes by the fire.

'Well, ladies,' I say, removing my hat and gloves and smiling, 'here we are again.'

Afterwards, I walk down to Leicester-square. Minded to take some supper, I turn into Castle-street and enter Rouget's, having briefly inspected the offerings in Mr Quaritch's window en route.5 I take my seat by the window, order up supper Julienne soup, some pate d'Italie, bread, and a bottle of red wine. For an hour or more I sit in gloomy contemplation of my desolation; then I call for another bottle.

At half past eleven, the waiter opens the door to the street for me to pa.s.s through and holds out his hand towards me as I mount the step, but I push him away with a curse. For a moment or two I am unable to remember where I am. A crowd of bravoes roll towards me and look me up and down, thinking perhaps that I'm ripe for picking. But I am still able to eye them back, defiantly spitting out my cigar b.u.t.t as I do so. They continue on their way.

'Looking for business, sir?'

d.a.m.n it. I've nothing else to do, and Miss Mabel and Miss Cissie are already dim memories. She's young, not too dirty, and has a pretty smile.

'Always looking for business, my dear.'

What's that? I turn as quickly as I can; but in my somewhat inebriated state I lose my balance and fall against the girl. She tries to hold me up but I'm too heavy, and we both end up on the pavement.

''Ere, wot's your game?' she asks indignantly.

But I am no longer interested in a piece of cheap cunny. That tap on the shoulder has brought me to my senses.

I see him reach into his pocket, and in another second the cosh is in his hand. The girl, screaming obscenities, scrambles up from the pavement and starts to kick at him. As he turns to push her away, I draw out my pistol and point it straight into the ugly face of Josiah Pluckrose.

We stand thus, eyeball to eyeball, until he gives me an evil smile, calmly replaces the cosh in his pocket, and walks off whistling.

Mr Abraham Gabb is a short, lean-shanked, gimlet-eyed gentleman possessing the vicious aspect of a terrier perpetually on the look-out for something to sink his teeth into and shake until its back-bone cracks. The public-house in Rotherhithe of which he is lord and master is, like himself, small, dirty, and vicious by reputation. Mine host regards me warily as I approach the bar; but I am used to such places, and to men such as him, and have only to look him in the eye, slap down some coins, and say but a few choice words before I have his complete attention.

Why am I here? First, because of something Lewis Pettingale had said, in pa.s.sing, during our meeting in Gray's-Inn. Second, because, on the day following my encounter with Pluckrose, I had called again on Miss Mabel and Miss Cissie in Gerrard-street. As I stood in the street afterwards, pulling on my gloves, I had suddenly throught of the poet Dryden. Now Dryden is not an author for whom I have ever harboured much enthusiasm, and I was at a loss as to why he was thrusting himself into my thoughts with such persistence. But an answer was not long in coming.

Number Forty-three Gerrard-street was that answer. Not only was it the house, two doors up from the residence of Madame Mathilde and her girls, in which Dryden had died in the year 1700: it was also the house in which Josiah Pluckrose was living when he was married to Mary Baker's sister, Agnes. Was it possible that he was living there still?

The answer to my question was soon provided by the scullery maid from the house next door: Mr Pluckrose had not vacated Number Forty-three after the murder of his wife but had brazenly remained there ever since, to the general disapprobation of his neighbours.

Not wis.h.i.+ng to keep this interesting piece of information to myself, I had resolved to share it as soon as possible with the brother of the late Isaac Gabb, the last member of the Newmarket gang to have suffered fatally at the hands of Josiah Pluckrose. According to Pettingale, the boy's brother had kept a public-house in Rotherhithe; a moment's consultation of the Directory on my return to Temple-street quickly identified the establishment and its location.

At first, Mr Abraham Gabb had received the news of Pluckrose's whereabouts in glowering silence; but then, as he sifted the information more carefully, his terrier eyes began to glint no doubt in eager antic.i.p.ation of renewing his acquaintance with the person who had undoubtedly done for his brother. My plan succeeded more easily than I'd antic.i.p.ated. It quickly appeared that mine host needed no proof of Pluckrose's guilt to rouse him to action. Having only ever known Pluckrose by his soubriquet of 'Mr Verdant', it had hitherto been impossible for Gabb to hunt down his brother's killer. Knowing now where he lived, and under what name, the landlord was in a position to mete out the vengeance he had long contemplated. Throwing back my brandy, I express myself heartily gratified that I have been able to perform this trifling service to him.

The landlord says nothing by way of reply, but, calling over two ugly looking, bull-backed bruisers who had been leaning together, deep in conversation, at the other end of the bar, he leaves me alone with the old woman while the three of them engage in a huddled conference. At length, after much whistling and pursing of lips, the landlord, nodding knowingly to his two compatriots, turns back towards me.

'You're sure Verdant is there?' Mr Gabb, still wary, fixes me with his eye as he strokes his dirty chin ruminatively.

'As sure as I'm standing here.'

'And wot's your int'rest in the matter?' he growls suspiciously.

'Hygiene!' I declaim. 'It is a pa.s.sion of mine. Filth physical and moral appals me. I am an eager promoter of clean water, clean thoughts, and the proper disposal of waste. The streets are awash with filth of every description. I simply wish to enlist you and your comrades in my crusade, by encouraging you to make a start on the permanent removal of filth from Number Forty-three Gerrard-street, at your earliest convenience.'

'You're mad,' says Mr Abraham Gabb, 'stark mad.'