“God bless you.”
“Thank you. The smaller key is for a unique structure at the southeast corner of Trafalgar Square.”
“I can’t think of what you mean, sir.”
“You’re familiar with the Square?”
“I’ve been through it a time or two now.”
“It goes unnoticed by most who pass it, but there is a stone column there with a miniature door and window. It looks very much like a large lamppost, but there is enough room inside it to fit a man.”
“And to lock him in?”
Day held the small key up so that Sir Edward could see it.
“Yes,” Sir Edward said. “It is the smallest jail cell in the whole of England.”
“But of what possible use is it?”
“I don’t know that it’s ever been used, and Inspector March was apparently the only detective to hold a key to it. My guess is that the key served as a totem for him. He wanted you to have it. Perhaps as nothing more than a keepsake. Or perhaps he thought you might see the same symbolic importance in it that he did.”
“I’m honored.”
Sir Edward turned his head and sneezed again.
“There it was,” he said. “I knew there was another sneeze coming.”
He blew his nose into his handkerchief and wiped his eyes with the heel of his hand.
“It will be my sad duty to visit Inspector Little’s widow this morning,” he said. “She will have questions, and I have no answers for her.”
Day was quiet.
“Go on, then,” Sir Edward said. “Get out there and bring me a murderer.”
“I will, sir.”
“Remember, detective work is as much about logical deduction as it is dogged footwork. Follow your train of thought and see where it takes you. And Day?”
“Sir?”
“If you don’t yet believe in yourself and your abilities, at least believe in Mr March’s opinion of you.”
“Yes, sir.”
Day fumbled with the knob before he managed to get the door open and slid out into the common room. It felt bright and airy compared to the close atmosphere in the commissioner’s heavy mahogany office.
As Day closed Sir Edward’s door behind him, he saw Sergeant Kett entering from the other side of the room, pushing a large man ahead of him. This would be the porter who’d found the trunk on the station platform.
“Got ’im here for you, Inspector,” Kett said.
“Good man, thank you.”
“What’s the fuss about?” Blacker said. He stood up from his desk.
“You’ll find out soon enough,” Day said. “I’d appreciate it if you could gather Little’s things for me. I’ll want to sort them after I speak to this man here.”
Blacker squinted. He was shorter than Day, a wiry man with limp ginger hair and a mustache that curled over his upper lip into his mouth.
“What’s happened to Little?”
Day gestured for Kett to take the porter to his desk, and he moved his body so that he could talk in semi-privacy with Blacker.
“He’s been killed.”
“No.”
“I’m afraid so. There’s a strong possibility it had to do with one of his cases.”
“Which one?”
“I don’t know. It could be any case, current or old.”
“Who’s working it? You?”
“I am.”
Day braced himself, waiting for an argument, but Blacker nodded.
“Whatever I can do to help, you let me know and I’m on it straightaway. I can’t say Little was my favorite, but he laughed at my jokes often enough.”
“Thank you, Detective.”
“Can’t have them killing us out there. Job’s hard enough as it is.”
Day watched Blacker walk to Little’s desk and open the top drawer; then he turned his attention to the porter and took a deep breath. It was going to be a long afternoon.
3
It was a beautiful afternoon.
The rain had swept out as suddenly as it had swept in, leaving fresh blue skies behind. The bald man had closed up shop for a bit, and now he sat on a bench and watched the children play. St James’s Park was crowded, children and their nannies strolling the paths that circled the canal. The bald man watched the little boy at the water’s edge. His pocket was full of biscuits, and a flock of honking ducks waddled after him. The boy ran this way and that, stopping when he ran out of breath, letting the ducks catch up while he giggled and hiccupped. He tossed a biscuit and the fat ducks ran after it, competing for the crunchy morsel, their bills clacking. Then it was gone and they were after him again.
The bald man smiled. It was good to see the boy enjoying himself. He looked as he had the first time the man had seen him. So much more pleasant than the boy’s more recent tears and bargaining.
A breeze blew through the lime trees and the bald man tucked his hat down lower on his forehead. An unpleasant odor wafted over from the sheep enclosure, but even that was tolerable on such a fine day.
A carriage rolled down the path between the bald man and the boy he was watching. One enormous wheel turned up a stone and chucked it into the bark of a tree behind the bench. The bald man looked with alarm at the fresh scar in the tree trunk. So close that the stone might have injured him. When the carriage had passed, the bald man glanced back at the canal and the boy was gone.
He stood, nearly frantic, and scanned the small clutches of Londoners enjoying the fine dry weather. There. The boy was at the far curve of the water’s edge, talking to a little girl. She was dressed in what looked like her Sunday finery, but the lace at the hem of her dress was worn, and the collar was too tight around her pretty throat.
The bald man strolled in their direction, trying to appear calm, forcing himself not to run. His beating heart drowned out the sound of the gravel crunching under his feet. He was still too far away to hear what the boy and the girl were talking about. What was the boy saying?
“Here now,” he said.
He was close enough that his voice carried to the children and the boy looked up at him, his eyes wide. The girl looked up too and followed the boy’s gaze to the imposing man as he finally drew near them.
“What are we on about, then?”
“Nothing, sir,” the boy said.
“He doesn’t know where he lives,” the girl said. “Are you his papa? You should teach him his street.”
“I should, shouldn’t I?”
“I know mine. Wanna hear it?”
The bald man imagined pushing the little girl into the canal and holding her under the water. He could clearly picture her struggling against him, her eyes magnified by the water as they dimmed.
His fingers tingled and his hands shook with the imagined thrill.
Killing the detective had been a necessary evil, not anything he would have considered doing before the accident. But now he thought of it often, relishing the details.
He closed his eyes for a moment, remembering the thick needle as it pierced Inspector Little’s lips, the tip of it pressing the skin above the detective’s beard, then thrusting through, a dot of blood following the black thread back through the dead man’s flesh. He pushed the thought away, took a deep shuddering breath, and glanced around at the clusters of women and children around him.
He looked down at the girl and smiled.
“Aren’t you a pretty thing?”
“I am, aren’t I? Do you like my dress?”
“I do very much.”
“It’s my best one. I have a puppy.”
“That’s wonderful.”
He turned his attention to the boy, who was standing stock-still, staring at the bald man’s shoes.