‘Police! Quick! For God’s sake, someone fetch a doctor! There has been an horrific crime committed!’
EIGHTEEN
Quinn gave a brief, commanding nod to Inchball for him to remain at his post, and went with the fellow.
He was led at a half-run – ‘Please, hurry!’ – out of Leicester Square, across Charing Cross Road and into a dimly lit alleyway, one of the two passages through to St Martin’s Lane. Quinn glanced at the street sign, which told him it was Cecil Court.
There were voices ahead of him, and a horrible, high-pitched wailing. It was the sound of shredded flesh. The cries of a tortured animal. Although there was something in it that enabled him to identify its source as human, and probably female.
Quinn made out a huddle of crouching men. A light went on in one of the shop windows, which was filled with kinematographic cameras and lighting equipment. It seemed that some of these lights had been activated, and their beams directed towards the scene unfolding in front of the premises. Whether this was to aid the actions of the men in the alley, or to provide illumination for filming, Quinn could not be sure.
His escort cried out for them to be let through. The handful of men rose and parted as one, turning towards Quinn as though they had been waiting for him. There was a peculiar solemnity to their movements that seemed almost choreographed. Perhaps in these circumstances some instinct takes over, and affects all men in the same way. It seemed that everyone knew what to do.
A young woman lay on the ground, writhing and gasping for air so that she could keep up her savage keening. She held both hands to her right eye. Blood seeped out through her fingers and was smeared across her face. Her hair appeared to be matted with it too and there were bloodstains on the pavement.
Drawn by an irresistible urge to know what lay behind her hands, Quinn swept forward and stooped over her. The lights from the shop window were directed unflinchingly on her face. Quinn gazed on her gaping lips as a lover might on his beloved. He reached out a hand and gently touched hers. The shrillness of her screams intensified.
‘Please, it’s all right. I’ll not hurt you. I’m a policeman. I’m here to help.’
The woman seemed not to understand him. Certainly she showed no sign of being reassured by his words. The one eye that was visible bulged with renewed fear.
‘What happened here?’ Quinn addressed his words to the men at his back. But when he turned, he saw that they had all gone. No doubt it was the word policeman that had seen them off.
The only one who remained was the man who had raised the alarm.
‘She needs a doctor,’ said Quinn.
He heard the clatter of a horse-drawn cab pulling up. A moment later, as if responding to a cue, a tall clean-shaven gentleman in evening dress presented himself. The man was probably in his late thirties. He walked with the brisk upright confidence born of authority. ‘I am a doctor.’ His accent was foreign, but its precise origin was unidentifiable, at least to Quinn.
Quinn moved to one side and allowed the doctor to attend to the injured woman.
Perhaps sensing his professional authority, she allowed her hands to be teased slowly from her face.
There, where her right eye should have been, there was a rusting circle of gore around a black chasm that not even the lights from the kinematographic supply shop could illuminate.
Quinn stared for a long time into that hole. Its darkness was like nothing that he had ever seen, or wanted to see again. It seemed to go on forever, to extend far beyond the dimensions of the young woman’s eye socket, further even than the extent of her head.
‘I must staunch the bleeding,’ said the doctor. He removed a handkerchief from his pocket and placed it over the empty eye socket. The woman whimpered at his touch but allowed it.
The doctor turned to Quinn. ‘I have a cab waiting. I can take her to the nearest hospital.’
‘She has been attacked. I am a police detective. I will need to take a statement from her.’
‘First we need to get her to a hospital. We must stabilize her condition. She is in severe shock, of course. You will get nothing out of her now. She will need sedation and medication for the pain. When she has had a chance to rest, you will be able to talk to her.’
Quinn ignored the doctor’s opinion, which he had not solicited. ‘Who did this to you?’
The woman became agitated, turning her head rapidly from side to side in fearful denial.
The doctor placed a hand behind her head to protect her from the effects of her own agitation. ‘I must protest!’
The victim’s teeth locked together, as if in spasm. A stifled gargling sounded in her throat. Quinn leaned forward, edging the doctor out of the way. He lowered his head to place his ear close to her mouth.
‘You would do better to help me get her into my cab! Our first duty is to preserve her life. Then, there will be time to go after the perpetrator.’
But Quinn was insistent. ‘Did you see him? The man who did this to you?’
A strangled stuttering eked itself out between her clenched teeth. ‘T-t-t-t-d-d-d …’
‘Yes?’ Quinn nodded encouragement.
He sensed her body tense. She seemed to be gathering her powers for a supreme effort.
‘My dear! You must not exert yourself.’ The doctor cast a disapproving scowl at Quinn. In an undertone he hissed: ‘Stop this now! You are putting her life at risk!’
‘You saw the man! You saw him!’ It was no longer a question, but an urgent insistence.
The woman raised herself in the doctor’s arms. ‘Tayyy-vvvvl!’
‘What did she say?’ Quinn turned to the doctor.
‘I don’t know. I didn’t hear.’ But there was something suspect about his demurral.
She repeated the sound, more quietly, but also more calmly. ‘Tayvl.’
‘Table? Is she saying something about a table?’ wondered Quinn.
‘No, I don’t think so. I think …’
‘Is it German? Is she German? Are you German?’
‘I am not German. My name is Casaubon. I am French.’
‘But you understand what she is saying?’
‘I know that she is not speaking German.’
‘Tell me, what language is she speaking?’
‘I believe it may be Yiddish. Tayvl is the Yiddish word for—’
But the woman herself cut in: ‘Day-vil! The day-vil did this!’
Quinn was aware of a stir behind him, footsteps running, a flash of light. He looked around and saw Bittlestone of the Clarion with his photographer. ‘Sensational!’
Sergeant Macadam was on their heels.
Quinn turned back to the woman in time to see her one remaining eye swivel and judder as it lost focus before closing. She fell back limply.
‘We must get her to a hospital!’
Quinn stood up and turned on the journalist angrily. ‘You will not publish that photograph. You will not release any details of this crime, not without my authorization. Do you understand?’
The photographer scuttled away under the force of Quinn’s ire, though Bittlestone stood his ground: ‘You cannot stifle a free press, Inspector.’
Quinn relented a little. ‘There may be an aspect of national security here. Even your proprietor must have some sensitivity to that. I must consult with my superiors. I suggest you do the same. In the meantime, you can make yourself useful. Help Doctor Casaubon.’ He turned to the man who had led him there. ‘You too.’
Bittlestone and the other man took a step closer to the wounded woman but, for the moment at least, would go no further than that. It was as if they had walked into an invisible fence. A vacant inertia came over them both. They showed no sign of horror, but rather watched her writhing with fascinated frowns. They seemed to have become disassociated from the moment.