She led me backwards towards the bed-stead, and sat down.
‘Your carriage awaits you, Mr Geddington,’ she said, the exhaustion now plain in a barely withheld yawn.
‘Oh no, my lady,’ said I, turning her round as I spoke. ‘I know my place. I’ll take the back stairs, if you please.’
And so to Bluegate-fields, dangerous and deadly. A black gash of damp stone leads up from a narrow court, and into another kind of fog, dry and burning, which hurts the eyes as it curls and drifts about the room. A Lascar is huddled on the dirty, rain-stained floor, another attenuated figure mumbles in a far corner, and an empty divan awaits.
I lie down, am handed the instrument of dreams, loaded with its potent freight, and the dissolution begins. Clouds, piercing sunlight, the shining peaks of eternal mountains, and a cold green sea. An elephant gazes at me with a look of ineffable compassion in its small dark eyes. A man with red hair whose face I cannot see.
The boundaries of this world are forever shifting – from day to night, joy to sorrow, love to hate, and from life itself to death; and who can say at what moment we may suddenly cross over the border, from one state of existence to another, like heat applied to some flammable substance? I have been given my own ever-changing margins, across which I move, continually and hungrily, like a migrating animal. Now civilized, now untamed; now responsive to decency and human concern, now viciously attuned to the darkest of desires.
I admit these degradations because they are true, as true as anything else in this confession; as true as the killing of Lucas Trendle and my hatred of Phoebus Daunt; and as true as the cursed love I hold, and will always hold, for her whom I cannot yet name. If these acts disgust you, then it must be so. I do not – cannot – seek to excuse them, or explain them; for the terrible itching urge to wander perpetually, like some poor Ahasuerus,* between light and darkness, will stay with me, driving me under its goad, until the day of my death.
A reviving cigar and I return to the fog-weighted streets. Once again, I wearily climb the stairs to my rooms in Temple-street as the day struggles into life.
On reaching my sitting-room, I slumped heavily into the chair by the fireplace I had left some hours before and fell into a deep untroubled sleep.
I awoke with a start a little before noon, thinking of Jukes.
Fordyce Jukes was my neighbour on the ground floor. I loathed his greasy, cunning look and insinuating manners: ‘So nice to see you, Mr Glapthorn. Always a pleasure, Mr Glapthorn. A touch cold today, Mr Glapthorn.’ I learned to expect the opportune opening of his door as I passed up or down the stairs; the glutinous smile of greeting; and always the infallible sense of a watching eye at my back.
It was Jukes! I was sure of it. I should have seen it immediately. He had followed me that night to Cain-court. He knew it all.
He was a clerk in the offices of Tredgold, Tredgold & Orr, solicitors, of Paternoster-row, where I was also employed, and of which I shall have occasion to speak more fully hereafter. Clever enough, certainly; educated enough, with sufficient knowledge of my comings and goings to ensnare me. Yes, it must be Jukes. Under the pretence of civility, his eye was always upon me, as if he half knew that I was not what I seemed. And he had recently had the opportunity to snoop amongst my papers, as I shall later relate. We had never spoken of Bella, it was true; our conversations had been scrupulously neutral on all personal matters; but he had watched me, followed me, and had found her out.
What had begun it? I knew him to be a damned inquisitive meddler; my nocturnal ramblings were frequent, and the stairs would have creaked out my exits to his always receptive ears. An urge one night – impossible for him to resist – to follow me out, to see where I went and what I did, was repeated on other nights until a habit was formed. How many shadows had welcomed his watching eye; how many doorways, how many dark and secret places?
Then, one night in late October, he followed me again, a little earlier than usual, puzzled by the apparent lack of any specific intent or objective, as I made my way to Threadneedle-street. He could not see Lucas Trendle standing outside the Bank; only I could see him. But he continued to watch, still puzzled, as I proceeded westwards towards the Strand.
He could not know why I committed the deed that he witnessed, but he knew that I did it. He knew.
The revelation galvanized me. After splashing my face with cold water, I descended the stairs. Jukes’s door stayed closed, and there was no sound from within, for these were of course his usual hours at Tredgolds. But I knew that he must have contrived to be absent from the office for the afternoon in order to carry out his intention to confront me at Stoke Newington, or at least to satisfy himself that I had accepted his invitation to pay my last respects to Lucas Trendle. All the same, I stopped at the foot of the stair-case and contemplated forcing an entrance to his chambers, in order to secure confirmation that the hand responsible for the two anonymous notes was his. But this, I decided, was both foolhardy and unnecessary; so I stepped out into the street, to execute the plan I had formed.
I was in Chancery-lane in time for the half-past-twelve omnibus to Stoke Newington, for it was now the 3rd of November, and Mr Lucas Trendle was to be buried. The omnibus came and left without me – I did not intend to take any chances. I therefore held back, observing every face that passed along the street, every stationary or loitering figure. Then I moved to the back of the queue for the next green ‘Favourite’, which I boarded, immediately descending as it pulled away. Satisfied that I had not been followed, I finally took my place on the one o’clock vehicle, and arrived at last at my destination.
Through the Portals of Death,* surmounted by hieroglyphs announcing ‘The Gates of the Abode of the Mortal Part of Man’, I walked into Abney Cemetery, in the quiet village of Stoke Newington. London lay behind me, beneath a louring and obscuring red-yellow pall interposed between earth and sky, the progeny of a million chimneys. Here the air was clear, the day dull, but with a promise of brightness.
It wanted an hour until the time. I wandered, as a casual visitor might, amongst the spacious lawns and Lebanon cedars, observing the monuments of granite and marble – some striking, most of a becoming simplicity, for this was a resting-place for Non-Conformist mortality; the petrified angels; the columns and draped urns. I examined the small Gothic Chapel, and then made my way over to a fenced-off spot, around a large and venerable chestnut-tree, that marked the favourite place of retirement of Dr Watts,* friend of the former Lady Abney, and tutor to her daughters.
Lingering there, I looked about me, taking in the patterns of paths and walkways, and trying to picture to myself how events might unfold.
Would Jukes risk a direct approach in such a place? Would he take me quietly aside, and put some proposal to me for the maintenance of his silence? I could not feel in the least physically threatened by him – a stunted, weaselly fellow – and was, in any case, well prepared for that eventuality. I would take the initiative, and suggest a civilized discussion of the matter, gentleman to gentleman. He would be appreciative of my consideration; no need for unpleasantness, no need at all. Simply a little matter of business. A stroll, perhaps, towards the Chapel, and a further meeting arranged – at some mutually convenient place and time in Town – in order to conclude matters. Then I would secure my advantage, complete and final.
Thus I imagined as I continued to stroll slowly up and down the path, as if in sober contemplation of my surroundings. I took out my watch. A few moments later the church clock tolled three.