Scape's elbow had dug sharply into my ribs, expelling my breath and thus silencing me; his blow had been concealed beneath the fold of his greatcoat. I looked around into his face and saw beneath the blue lenses the threat of further violence.
He turned towards Lord Bendray. "Mr Dower told me back at the gaol – when I went to get him – that he was feeling kinda exhausted. Been a long night, you know? So he doesn't really feel like discussing things right now." Scape brought his ingratiating smile around to me, where it hardened in place. I kept my tongue still.
Lord Bendray had taken no notice of any of this byplay. "A pity," he said, leaning back into the brougham's leather plush. "I do hope, then, that he'll accept my invitation out to my country estate. You'll find it most restful there, Dower. And, of course, there is so much business we would be able to discuss at our leisure – propositions I'm sure will be… most interesting."
I received a hidden nudge from Scape. "Ah… yes. Yes, of course," I said quickly. "Very gracious of your Lordship, I'm sure. However – I'm not sure I could get away right now." I could in fact envision no more dreadful prospect than being spirited away to some remote mansion, there to be further mauled by this man's lunacies, without even the benefit of the constabulary's timely intervention. "Pressures of business, you know. Yes; very busy time for me. The watch trade always picks up this time of year-" I caught, from the corner of my eye, Scape's frowning glare, and bit off my rattling elaboration.
Lord Bendray's chin wrinkled below his child-like pout, as though he were enduring the refusal of a playfellow to come to a birthday fete. "Well," he said, gazing stoically out the window, "I do hope you'll be able to see your way clear."
"I'm sure," said Scape heavily, "that Mr Dower will give it every consideration." He leaned closer to me, displaying my pallid reflection in his dark spectacles.
There was no further conversation; I was let off with my bundle of clothing in front of my shop, and the brougham clattered hastily away. Before I could turn my key in the lock, I heard a sharp yapping from behind. I turned and saw Fexton's terrier, somewhat dust-covered from running behind the brougham, looking up from the pavement. Its tongue lolled panting from the side of its mouth as its bright, expectant gaze held on me.
"Poor wretch," I murmured as I bent to scratch behind its up-pricked ear; the animal wriggled in pleasure. I was not alone in having had a tortuous odyssey through the night. The dog had been clever enough to transfer its innate loyalties to me once it had perceived that its master Fexton had been murdered; then that faithfulness had drawn it along to every station to which I had been forced. No doubt it had been waiting outside the gaol when I had been released.
"Well, then; come on." I pushed the shop door open and bade the animal enter. "Fellow campaigners owe some civility to each other, I suppose."
Creff hurried downstairs to greet me. "Thank the heavens you're back, sir! Most worried, I was… when they came and told me – what's that?" He peered down at my companion, busily engaged in scratching himself with a hind leg.
"That, I have been informed, is a bell-dog. Find him something to eat, will you? I'm sure the poor creature is famished." I shuffled past him and laid my hand on the railing of the stairs. "And leave the shutters down; we shan't be opening today. I'll be retiring to my bed for some time." I shifted the bundle under my arm and wearily pulled myself up the first step.
"Your pardon, sir – but there's someone here as wants to see you."
I halted and looked back at him. "Here? Surely you turned any callers away-"
"Oh, no, sir; I tried, but I couldn't; she was very form a-double, you might say."
A formidable woman, here, to see me; my gaze travelled up the stairs to my parlour door. For a moment I quailed, thinking that perhaps Miss McThane had somehow managed to be transported from Lord Bendray's brougham where I had last seen her. "Did she give a name?" I asked.
"A Mrs Trabble, sir. She wouldn't state her business. Said it was a matter of some… ahem…" His voice sank to a whisper. "… delicacy."
I could well imagine. I could feel the blood draining out of my face as I contemplated the prospect of confronting such a visitor. Mrs Augustina Trabble, in her role as founder and leader of the Ladies Union for the Suppression of Carnal Vice, had made considerable impact of late, both in London society and in the popular press. Rumours of her assaults upon the titled habitues of London's demi-monde – the result of her moral outrage and complete fearlessness – were rife; had she not in fact confronted the Prince of Wales himself in his box at the El Dorado music-hall in Leicester Square, and upbraided him for the poor example he had made of himself to the lower classes? (Other stories went so far as to attribute the fire that made smouldering ashes of the establishment to her doing.) There was likely not a cigar divan in the whole city where her name was not cursed by swells impatient with her interference in the pursuit of their sordid pleasures.
But what did such a daunting figure have to do with me? I had no idea. Perhaps – the best that my poor tired brain could imagine – merely a request for a donation to her organization's good works? The installation of a gaslight in the alley behind the shop, the better to discourage its use as a rendez-vous both romantic and mercantile in nature? There was, unfortunately, but one way to find out; with faltering tread, I mounted the stairs.
"Mrs Trabble." I closed the door behind me. "I'm honoured-"
"Sit down, young man," she said sternly, indicating the chair across from her.
Her intimidating gaze skewered me to the faded horsehair upholstery. A large woman, in unornamented black bombazine; there seemed to be enough of her great bosomed presence to make two or three such as myself; a fierce square jaw, as though a block of granite had been interposed between the brim of her feathered hat and her high lace collar, and a grim visage chiselled therefrom – in all, a person of some reckoning, even beyond her reputation. I sat, unable to do otherwise.
"Reports have come to my attention." Her large hands folded themselves on the reticule in her lap. "Disturbing reports; most disgusting reports, if I may say so."
"Reports? Of – of what?"
"Of your behaviour, Mr Dower." Her chin thrust itself towards me, like the sharp prow of a warship. "Your little… adventures. For far too long, your kind has believed that the night affords you the anonymity to pursue and indulge in the filthiest of practices; well, you may disabuse yourself of that notion as of this moment, Mr Dower. There is no security for the sybarite in the darkness; the Ladies Union has vigilant agents in all corners of the city, and all share my abhorrence at the mischief of your bestial tribe. You may rest assured of that."
I stared at her in astonishment. "I have no idea what you're speaking about," I protested.
"I think you know very well, Mr Dower." Her eyes narrowed to pinpricks of loathing. "Will you attempt to deny that you have been heard seeking directions to certain establishments of ill repute, kept by a certain Mollie Maud? Establishments of a nature even more sinister than the usual sinks of vice – were you not intent on seeking dalliance with the infamous green girls?"
For a moment I couldn't remember where I had heard the name she had spat at me; then the voice echoed in my memory, of the cabby that had first agreed to take me to Wetwick. "No," I said after the moment's confusion. "That's entirely untrue…"
"You know nothing of this villainous woman's enterprise?"
I shook my head in mute denial.