She opened the curtains in all the rooms at the front of the house and started a fire in the parlor, then swept up the scattered tea leaves and returned to the kitchen to prepare breakfast.
She changed into a clean uniform and put the breakfast things on a tray, which she carried up the stairs and set on a low table outside Claire Day’s bedroom. She rapped twice on the closed door and continued down the hall to Mr Day’s bedroom. The bed was untouched, which might mean that Mr Day was visiting his wife in her own room this morning, but Mrs Dick presumed that he had not yet returned home.
Nevertheless, she stripped the bed and hung the bedding to air. The Days had an indoor toilet and there were no chamber pots to empty, but Mrs Dick was of the old school and kept up the old ways of airing sheets and blankets to ensure that there was no buildup of unsavory emanations in them.
She swept and dusted the room, cast an experienced eye over the floor, and decided it would not need to be scrubbed yet. She returned to her mistress’s room and was surprised to discover that the breakfast tray was still on the hall table and had not been touched. It was true that Mrs Day’s appetite had not been strong lately, but the water had gone cold in the pot and the tea leaves were dry.
Phillipa Dick rapped on the door again and waited. Finally she turned the knob and cracked the door open.
“Forgive me, missus. I beg yer pardon, but is there somethin’ else you’ll be wantin’ to eat this mornin’?”
There was no response. The room was dim, the curtains still drawn over the windows. Mrs Dick swung the door open and entered.
The stench rocked her on her heels. She pulled the end of her apron over her nose and tiptoed to the window on the other side of the room. She pulled the curtains back and in the dim light saw Mrs Day on the floor next to her bed. The younger woman was lying on her stomach with her nightshirt hiked up so that a sliver of lace panties was visible. Ordinarily Mrs Dick would have been scandalized, but this was clearly not the time for shock or judgment. She bent over the body and turned her mistress faceup. A long tendril of spit and vomit snaked down Claire’s cheek. Her skin was grey and cold, but she was breathing. Mrs Dick put her ear to Claire’s chest and listened for a beating heart. When she was sure that Claire was alive, she made her as comfortable as possible, bringing pillows from the bed to put under her head. She covered her with a thick quilt, taking care to keep the edge of it out of the puddle of sick.
The carpet would have to be thrown out.
Mrs Dick hurried downstairs and threw open the front door. It was early yet and there was little traffic, but a young boy was walking a bicycle over the curb and Mrs Dick called him over.
“Go fetch a doctor. Dr Entwhistle on Cathcart. Do it quick and there’s a ha’penny in it for you.”
The boy studied her face and set his jaw. “Looks like you need ’im round here pretty bad, lady.”
“Just do as I tell you, boy.”
“Aye, I will. But not for less than a penny.”
“Why, you little demon.”
“Suitcherself.”
He began to turn away, but Mrs Dick grabbed him by the shoulder.
“Very well, then, you’ll get your penny, but if the doctor’s not here within the hour I’ll not be givin’ you a thing, you hear?”
“You bet, ma’am. I’ll get ’im round here right away, you wait and see.”
He hopped on his bicycle and rode off, pedaling furiously. Phillipa Dick watched until he was out of sight and then turned back inside, shut the door, and waited.
64
St James’s Park was quiet and cool. The gas lamps along the footpath pulled their yellow light in close, jealous of the rising sun, ignoring the police who tramped through the grass with their lanterns held low. Day stood next to Hammersmith in the darkness under the lime trees. He couldn’t look at the constable. Instead he watched the bobbing lanterns as every available police in the city searched the park for evidence, going over the same ground that a hundred other men had already scoured.
“Here?” Hammersmith said.
“Yes,” Day said. “Another trunk, same as with Little.”
“We should have caught him already. We should have caught him after Little.”
Day nodded. The fresh tang of limes stung his nostrils. There was nothing to say. It was barely two days since Little’s body was found, but Hammersmith was right.
“What about his face?”
“Sewn shut, same as before.”
“Colin would’ve hated that.”
“I doubt he felt it. He was probably already gone by the time the sewing started.”
Hammersmith was silent so long that Day finally looked over at him. Hammersmith was gazing at the rectangle of flattened grass.
“Where’s the body now?” he said. “Where’s the trunk?”
“Kingsley’s got him at the laboratory.”
“When he’s done, Colin will want a new uniform. He wouldn’t want to be in something wasn’t clean and fresh.”
“I’m sure that will be arranged.”
“Do you have a lead?”
“There was a little girl playing by the water who said her friend’s father deposited the trunk here.”
“Her friend’s father.”
“I know. It’s a slim clue, but there were no other witnesses.”
“So there’s nothing else?”
“We’re working it. Kingsley thinks his finger patterns will narrow the suspects down for us.”
“You said it happened yesterday.”
“I think so.”
“He was awfully tired yesterday. Colin was. Up all night on a case.”
“None of us have slept much these last few days.”
“No. But if I hadn’t pushed him so hard … And on a thing that … on a case that nobody wanted me working, anyway. He did it, though, he came along and he helped and he was tired and probably distracted.”
“You didn’t kill him.”
“But I didn’t help him. I wasn’t there when he finally needed me. He was always there when-”
Hammersmith’s voice broke and Day looked away into the trees and pretended not to notice the constable’s grief. There was no sense in embarrassing the man.
They stood like that for a long time, and then Hammersmith took a deep rattling breath, and when he spoke his voice was soft and low. There was something deadly behind his words.
“We’ll get him.”
“We will,” Day said.
“Do you think Kingsley’s still up and about?”
“I imagine he’s worked through the night on this. One murdered police is a disaster, two police is a war.”
“Then let’s get to his lab. If there’s news, if he finds something, I want to know about it immediately.”
“You should get some rest, so as to be ready when there is news.”
“I’ve had some rest.”
“Then we’ll go.”
The two of them headed up the footpath to where a fleet of wagons waited at the street. Behind them, the lanterns of the police bobbed like fireflies over the park’s tainted meadow.
65
Kingsley slid one of the jacket sleeves down Pringle’s left arm and dropped the empty sleeve in a bin. He did the same with the left shirtsleeve. He set the bare arm on the table next to the constable’s body and used a long metal skewer to pin it in place against the left shoulder. He dipped a rag into a basin of cold water and washed Pringle’s torso, dipping the rag in the basin again and again. The water in the basin turned pink, then red, then black, and Kingsley dumped it out, refilled it. Bits of blue and white thread from his uniform had been embedded in the constable’s skin by the force of the murder weapon. Kingsley bent over the body with tweezers and pulled out each thread.
He stepped back and bent his head, first to one side then the other until his neck popped, then went back to work separating the man from his uniform.